The Fall Guy (May 11)

There’s nothing about this movie that merits it being the biggest box office dud of the summer so far, falling short of the $120 million cost by nearly half in ticket sales over the past two weekends: the casting is compelling, the story perfectly serviceable, and the metacommentary on stuntmen stunting makes for some great physical comedy. I’ve seen way worse “movies” that made way more money than this one. The director, David Leitch, did all those other movies that you liked, so why are you suddenly so fickle? When did you decide you had “standards”? That you wanted a plot that “made sense”?

Friend, who came with me, was not impressed–or was maybe phobic of the fact that I was coming off of a five day cold that’s rampaged through my home like wildfire and stolen all hope and cheer that existed in the world–and left for (what I think of as) a (crucial?) 20 minute portion directly after Colt Seavers is tasked with going to Tom Ryder’s hotel to check in on him, when the movie kind of departs from the trailers for a little and warms up to actual crime fighting in all senses of the word, but I can see how he might see that time as better spent refilling a soda. His major criticisms have to do with the way that Later Leitch is typified by neurotic metacommentary in the script and bloated runtimes whereas Classic Leitch is short, snappy, and to the point, but I kind of think of Bullet Train as being the high water mark of last year’s action movies, which cannot possibly be thought of Classic Leitch, except in style.

I’m actually surprised by how autobiographical the script feels, the heart beating inside of this admittedly stupid plot which asks you to respect the craft. The Fall Guy is a procedural in the sense of showing its work, showing you how hard it is to do the thing and make it look easy. So, the adulation aside, the fix that I can propose is to remove Stephanie Hsu from the movie entirely.

Hear me out: in terms of diversity, you still have the messy tech wiz lady and Winston Duke steals the show in so many ways. It’s just everything about her grinds the story to a halt. She has this cell phone that no one else has bothered to inquire about? She seems to know it’s super valuable but has been waiting for a good guy–with connections–to offload it? And it returns our hero back to the apartment he’s already been to once before, which feels like such a needless backtrack (I’m not hating on the sticky note jokes, which are chaotic and amazing), and clearly it’s meant to allow for Colt to arrive with an entourage so that he can do battle with the prop gun, etc., etc. But the lead up to that action sequence just feels like chasing our tails (in a way that anyone who’s played the detective noir game City of Angels totally understands–day 7 and you’re still stuck asking the same witness a myriad of questions because you physically can’t make it to any other part of the city in time). So this is my proposal, have him find the cell phone and or the passcode in some other part of his journeys that doesn’t require a backtrack. See if that can’t shave off fifteen minutes and still preserve a cool fight sequence. Also, what is her job? It’s so weirdly undefined? She walks dogs for the talent, but also wants to produce? Is she a PA?

Friend said she was upset by the fact that a scene was in the trailer that wasn’t in the movie, but looking at the official trailer at Universal’s YT page, it all seems above board, so if someone can crowdsource that factcheck, I would be grateful.