Movie Review: 'The Fall Guy' Starring Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt

The Fall Guy (2024)

Directed by David Leitch

Written by Drew Pearce

Starring Ryan Gosling, Emily Blunt, Winston Duke, Aaron Taylor Johnson, Hannah Waddingham

Release Date May 3rd, 2024

Published May 3rd, 2024

The Fall Guy is so much fun. Ryan Gosling stars as stunt man Colt Seavers, the double for famed movie star Tom Ryder (Aaron Taylor Johnson). Colt has everything going for him, a great job that he loves doing, a great reputation, and he's just fallen in love with a camera operator on the new movie he's working on. Jody (Emily Blunt) and Colt are making plans and fliting and generally getting along smashingly when a stunt goes wrong. Performing a fall from a few stories up, Colt's rigging fails, and he smashes to the ground.

Having suffered a devastating back injury, costing him his job and reputation as a stunt man, Colt retreats into a self-imposed isolation. This includes leaving Jody behind as he doesn't want her to see him as less than the man he was. 18 months go by, and Colt is just getting by parking cars when he receives an emergency call. Gail (Hannah Waddingham), Tom Ryder's protector and producer, needs Colt to fly to Australia immediately to help out on Tom's new movie, Metal Storm. Tom has gone missing, and Gail needs Colt to stand in for him on the movie and also help find the missing star.

Tom has fallen in with some dangerous types down under and while Colt feels no obligation to help Tom, he decides to help because if he doesn't the movie will fall apart. Why does this matter? Because the director is Jody. It's her first time directing a major motion picture and if Tom disappears, she could get fired and lose everything. Wanting to reconnect with the woman he loves, Colt sets about trying to find Tom while performing his stunts on the movie, all while Jody finds new ways to punish him for ghosting her after his accident.

Shenanigans ensue and big stunts are performed, and all the while Colt pines for Jody, and she tries to resist his charm. The Fall Guy was directed by former stuntman turned action movie director David Leitch whose kinetic style and stunt heavy aesthetic have resulted in the first John Wick movie, Atomic Blonde, and Bullet Train among other super fun action flicks. Here, Leitch is dabbling in some romantic comedy alongside his action and stunts and the mix is solid enough. Leitch is not a natural with dialogue scenes, so he smartly relies on his actors to get to the heart and comedy stuff while he focuses on big, spectacular, special effects.

The approach works because Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt are so incredibly appealing. Gosling and Blunt have a delightful, flirty, funny chemistry that leaps off the screen. They are having so much fun that the at times wonky pacing and awkward comedy works well enough just on their charm. I can understand critics who go hard on The Fall Guy for some of the awkward transitions and the ways that the actors are clearly thinking on their feet to get something out of a scene, but I liked these actors enough not to care too much about the less than perfect aspects of The Fall Guy.

The Fall Guy promises fun and delivers fun. Does it work perfectly? No, but stunts and stunt work are rarely perfect. The action is fun, the story is silly, and the romance is sweet and charming. Enough of The Fall Guy is great that the problems don't really matter. Will The Fall Guy be a movie I remember at the end of the year? Maybe not, but when people mention The Fall Guy to me, I will smile and laugh and recommend that if they haven't seen it, they absolutely should. The Fall Guy is simply a good time at the movies.

Find my archive of more than 20 years and more than 2000 movie reviews at SeanattheMovies.blogspot.com. Find my modern review archive on my Vocal Profile, linked here. Follow me on Twitter at PodcastSean. Follow the archive blog on Twitter at SeanattheMovies. Listen to me talk about movies on the I Hate Critics Movie Review Podcast. If you have enjoyed what you have read, consider subscribing to my writing on Vocal. If you'd like to support my writing, you can do so by making a monthly pledge or by leaving a one time tip. Thanks!