The Fall Guy, starring Emily Blunt and Ryan Gosling, is a gloriously fun, screwball action film that pokes fun at action films and this, I now know, is my favorite kind of action film. I would even venture that it’s the sort of film that’s crying out to be enjoyed with a big old bucket of popcorn. Go wild with the stuff. I promise I won’t hiss or look daggers at you. This is a popcorn movie. It has that spirit — in spades.
Does anyone crash backwards through a plate glass window? Of course they do!
As a comedy set in the stunt world, it’s one of those Hollywood films that affectionately sends up Hollywood, like Tropic Thunder or Bowfinger. It is written by Drew Pearce and directed by David Leitch, who has form in the action genre (John Wick, Deadpool 2, Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw) and was once the stunt double for Brad Pitt. You can see why his CV stood out. The starting point here is the 1980s American TV series The Fall Guy, which starred Lee Majors as stunt man Colt Seavers, although if you’re after Majors’s best work then that would have to be The Six Million Dollar Man, surely. (Perhaps that’s an argument for another day.)
Gosling plays the Colt character but is not given an original song (“I’m Just Colt?”) to sing on this occasion. He’s the stunt double for famous action star Tom “I do all my own stunts” Ryder (played by Aaron Taylor-Johnson, who was tipped to be the next Bond for about four minutes). This Tom may or may not be based on the Tom that is Tom Cruise who is currently filming Mission: Impossible 786, or whatever number they are up to now.
All is good in Seavers’s life at the outset. He’s about to wrap on a film and is happily romancing Jody (Blunt), a camerawoman with director ambitions. One last stunt and that’s it, they’re off on a beach vacation — but something goes horribly wrong and he’s badly injured. Cut to eighteen months later where, we find, he has ditched his career, is working as a parking valet, and can’t face anyone, including Jody. “She tried to be there for me,” his voice-over tells us, “but I just couldn’t do it.” Enter Gail (Hannah Waddingham), Ryder’s powerful, ruthless producer — “I make big hits for little people” — who persuades him to return to work on Metalstorm, a blockbuster that is being directed by Jody.
It’s a “space-cowboy and alien romance” set in a Dune-style desert. (Sand, sand, so much sand.) Jody isn’t happy to see Colt, given he ghosted her. Can he win her back? Can he also turn detective and find Ryder, who seems to have disappeared? This is an action film set against the backdrop of an action film. Now ask me: does anyone crash backwards though a plate glass window and fall on top of the car? Of course they do!
The Fall Guy has its car chases and speed boat chases and explosions and balls of fire so it’s giving everything an action film would give but in a clever, knowing way. It’s also surprisingly interesting about stunt work itself. There are many jokes about other films — “If this were The Fugitive and you were Harrison Ford wouldn’t the bad guys be turning up around now?’” — and the script is witty even when it’s deliberately cheesy. “Being thrown from a car hurts. Being set on fire hurts. But nothing hurts as much as being without you,” Colt says to Jody.
And get this: while these roles are hardly a stretch for Blunt and Gosling, they do have actual, bona fide chemistry. Watch out for the cameos (Lee Majors!) and do stay for the end credits. Your choice doesn’t have to be popcorn, by the way. It could be any other noisy snack that, in normal circumstances, would push me over the edge.
This article was originally published in The Spectator’s UK magazine. Subscribe to the World edition here.
