The Fall Guy

Emily Blunt and Ryan Gosling appearing on stage at the Oscars this year to introduce an homage to stunt performers was one of the more awkward moments of the ceremony (until Pacino almost did an impression of Beatty and Dunaway). The sentiment and intro was wonderful, and the homage itself was genuinely moving, shining a well-deserved light on an element of the art that is designed to be invisible and thus often overlooked, despite how critical it is. But for the Oscars to do so in the midst of years of an ever-growing chorus for the addition of an award recognizing stunt work that feels as if it's reaching a fever pitch came off as tone deaf. Even more so in the wake of the announcement of the addition of Best Casting for 2026, showing they're not averse to adding new categories. They're paying all this lip service to the import of stunt performers, but can't be bothered to commit to doing so every year and honoring them on the level of the other artists. I understand there are a litany of complications to be ironed out, from who gets the statues to what the criteria is and so much more. The same was true of the other craft categories at some point, and the Academy figured it out. It's well past time.

Of course, Gosling and Blunt weren't there out of the goodness of their hearts, although I've no reason to doubt the earnestness of their admiration. They were there to use the massive success of Barbie and Oppenheimer to promote The Fall Guy, which is itself mostly a love-letter to stunt performers. In the theater, it opens with director David Leitch and Gosling chatting at us about the unsung profession. Gosling plays a stuntman who gets injured on the job almost as soon as we meet him, triggering self-doubts that cause him to stay away from movie sets for quite some time. And the film is littered with stunt performers not being respected by other key members of the crew despite all we see them do, including a direct reference to the lack of an Oscar for stunt work. Leitch's decision to helm a film which centers a stunt performer and integrates the wider crew into the climax makes even more sense given his background as a SAG award winning stunt performer and coordinator.

Colt Seavers (Gosling) makes his return to movies 18 months after breaking his back to help out Jody Moreno (Emily Blunt), a fling whom he alienated when he disappeared without a word shortly after the injury, who's been given a chance to direct her first film. So why would she want him on set? Turns out she doesn't. It was her producer, Gail Meyer (Hannah Waddingham), who called on Colt. Once Colt and Jody spar enough to reveal he's still in love and she's over him, we learn the real reason Gail called on Colt: the movie's buffoonish star Tom Ryder (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), for whom Colt has doubled for years, has gone missing, and she wants Colt to find him before Jody notices anything's wrong.

As you'd hope for in a movie celebrating stunt people, there are a bunch of big set pieces, many of which seemed to be done for real, a suspicion which was confirmed by the behind-the-scenes footage shown during the end credits. Granted, there are far too many scenes in which it's made to look quite fake by surrounding it with a bunch of CGI elements. Stuff like a boat crash into some fuel tanks which leads to a huge explosion didn't look very good, despite that specific shot being in the BTS. It's got kind of a Fast & Furious problem in that way, where green screen and post-production environments renders the real action less impressive.

Still, a dramatic car roll (eight and a half tumbles!) will always be intense, and one of my favorite action shots shows up midway through, where a vehicle jumps over some barrier using an improvised ramp in order to land just behind the car it's chasing. There's even an allusion to Fast Five towing a bank vault through city streets, only this time it's an overturned dumpster container in which Colt is fighting one of the bad guys, which looks pretty great. But my favorite has to be when he's fighting some goons in a nightclub after being drugged. The colors start to fray, sound gets a bit muddy, and the shutter speed and frame rate are dialed way way up, leading to a dream-like hyperreality which looks like nothing I've ever seen, maybe save for a couple scenes in Scott Pilgrim vs. the World.

The connective tissue between these set pieces is sorely lacking, though. The plot beats are boring and predictable, the characters don't take on much texture, their rapport is missing despite their will-they won't-they being the subplot which motivates a bunch of individual decisions, and it fails to really lean into its bigness. On paper, this story should be exciting and energetic, but in practice there were precious few moments which got my blood pumping. Even some of the set pieces came across as dreary and plodding, only standing out due to their juxtaposition with the dramatic scenes. It never quite figured out how to execute its tone. It definitely wants to be a comedy first, as almost every serious beat is undermined in some way. But that just makes them feel unnecessary, and tells us not to care, so it doesn't really work when other parts want us invested in what happens to Colt and Jody. Even the comedy mostly feels forced and awkward. It tries to utilize fast talking yet playful verbal combat, but can't quite pull it off. Don't get me wrong, there are a handful of solid laughs, but I was surprised at how rarely they took any big swings.

This despite the chemistry we've seen from Blunt and Gosling on their promotional tour over the past few months, and their massive individual charm. They each have their moments to shine, but they are far and few between. Instead, despite their limited roles, it's Winston Duke (as stunt coordinator Dan Tucker) and Zara Michales (as tech-wiz Venti) who manage to be a lot more interesting and commanding of your attention. Even Stephanie Hsu manages to do great work in her short appearance as Tom's dog-walker.

I'm not predisposed to love popcorn flicks, this is true. I generally need something to hook me, be it a solid plot or style or incredible action or thematic depth or something. Looking at his filmography, it's probably not fair to expect any of that from a Leitch film. But I found it took a concerted effort to not let my mind wander in between action scenes. It's just so painfully generic that it was threatening to leave my head the moment I left the theater. I could easily see others getting some enjoyment out of this, so if you enjoyed stuff like Bullet Train, this is probably worth checking out, if not until it comes to digital. But for someone like me who's not content to turn off their brain, it failed to overcome the required hurdles.