Before Ryan Gosling became the stunt double Colt Seavers in The Fall Guy (2024), cinema had already done its part to highlight the work of these professionals who risk everything so that the directors have the perfect shot. Gosling played a stuntman in Nicolas Winding Refn’s acclaimed Drive (2011). Tarantino gave us Death Proof (2007) where he not only fathered Kurt Russell’s Stuntman Mike but also made veteran stuntwoman Zoë Bell the film’s protagonist. Old Quentin would repeat the dose with his Cliff Booth to take Brad Pitt to collect an Oscar for his Once Upon a Time…In Hollywood (2019). And so we can go back to 1932 with The Lost Squadron where some former pilots from the First World War enlist as stunt pilots in Hollywood.

Technology has undoubtedly raised the stakes in action sequences, but mechanical work and human skill make those scenes look as real as possible. In 1928 Buster Keaton performed perhaps his most daring feat. Keaton is a cinema icon and his actions always challenged the limits of the human body. In the film Steamboat Bill, Jr. there is a sequence in which a cyclone destroys a house, Keaton ends up unprotected in front of the house while the entire facade of the house collapses. Our hero emerges unscathed thanks to the fact that by “fortune” he was standing right in the place that allowed the window gap to pass over him. Although this maneuver was calculated, many uncontrollable factors could have made this perhaps his last great feat.

His Name Is Danger

But returning to The Fall Guy by director David Leitch (Atomic Blonde, Bullet Train) we find ourselves facing a true love letter to a profession that he knows very well. Leitch began his career on television as a stuntman and then in film where he worked both as a stuntman and stunt coordinator on multiple productions. His directorial debut with Atomic Blonde (2017) was overwhelming with a very underrated film. Now he goes straight to the essentials and puts Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt on a movie set where the first is a stuntman and the second is a director trying to make her debut film.

The script by Glen A. Larson and Drew Pearce focuses entirely on the action. The premise of the film revolves around Colt and Jody (Gosling and Blunt), their broken love relationship, and Colt trying to win back Jody’s love. All this takes place against the background of an action adventure in which Colt is framed for a murder and some very bad guys try to take him down. The story does not present plot challenges or intricate twists, but this is not its purpose either, its objective is simple and is achieved effectively. Gosling and Blunt prove their strength and charisma on screen and the film works thanks to them and the fluidity of the narration.

The Fall Guy is one of those films that the new Hollywood lacks, those that were designed to fill movie theaters in the summer but that did not become an insult to the audience. It’s a shame that the era of superheroes and streaming has devoured everything and the public is increasingly skeptical of going to a movie theater like in the old days unless it’s for a Marvel or a DC.