The stated goal of this action comedy, based loosely on a 1980s TV series, is to get the Motion Picture Academy to inaugurate an Oscar for stunt people, and given that the Academy recently announced it will do such a thing (though not for a while), the movie is clearly a success. As to its success as an entertainment product, it works hard for the viewer’s good favor, but I’ve felt for a while now that Ryan Gosling, the titular character, has been over-exending himself as a movie star ever since La La Land. Directed by David Leitch, a former stunt coordinator who’s seen success on his own with high-concept actioners (John Wick, Bullet Train), The Fall Guy positions Gosling as the kind of stone professional who may be too good at his job, which sort of describes Gosling as film icon. He’s not as insufferable as Tom Cruise, but you can tell his approach to leading man-ism is mostly about how well he sells a film’s overall gestalt, and not just his own performance.

Gosling’s character, Colt Seavers, is a highly touted stuntman whose own self-regard is severely tested by a horrific on-set accident that puts him in the hospital and then out of action for months, though the long recovery period seems to have more to do with his hurt pride than his physical well-being. Meanwhile, the stunt coordinator in charge of that shoot, Jody Moreno (Emily Blunt), has, like Leitch, graduated to the director’s chair and is now making a sci-fi epic called MetalStorm. The producer (Hannah Waddingham) tricks Colt into visiting the set so that he can be recruited to stunt double for the conceited star, Tom Ryder (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), for whom Colt has doubled before, but mainly it’s to force Colt and Jody to make nice again since Colt obviously blames her for his almost getting killed. For the most part, the give-and-take between director and stuntman, which glides on an unsubtle romantic undercurrent, is the best part of the movie because Gosling and Blunt excel at this kind of comedy, but then the screenwriter throws the whole thing out the window by revving up the plot with Ryder’s sudden disappearance and Colt’s search for him, which forces him into a whole new universe of action-packed intrigue that gets out of hand. Where did all these cartoon villains come from, and why?

It’s a question that the movie answers in time, but not necessarily in a satisfactory way. It should be said that the reason you go to see a movie like The Fall Guy is to find out exactly how they pull off some of those stunts, and Leitch delivers in that department. The screwball love stuff is just gravy, but the bada-bing action set pieces that line up like dominoes in the second half never cohere into anything more than pointless, deafening mayhem. 

The mayhem in The Garfield Movie is not as loud, but even more pointless when you consider the IP. I don’t know how many movies have been made so far about the lasagna-scarfing orange tabby—and that’s not to mention the TV show—but this is clearly one too many since it doesn’t even tap into the character’s most well-established traits. It’s really just a lame caper film that happens to trade on Garfield’s cynical sense of humor. 

First of all, Garfield (voiced with a bit too much enthusiasm by Chris Pratt) is not as annoying as he is in the comic strip, and his constantly pulling the rug out from under his “owner” Jon and persecuting the intellectually challenged dog Odie are toned down as if dictated by some kind of PC killjoy. In fact, the whole emotional atmosphere is stacked against that kind of cruel humor by positioning Garfield as a poster cat for neglected felines. We learn that Garfield was abandoned by his father as a kitten at an Italian restaurant, where he was adopted by Jon after eating his entire pizza. Years later, after becoming the cat we love to roll our eyes at, Garfield’s father, Vic (Samuel L. Jackson), reenters his life and then quickly pulls Garfield and Odie into a criminal scheme to help a sad bull (Ving Rhames) rescue the love of his life. 

None of this plays to Garfield the cat’s strengths as a character and so the movie has nothing particularly distinctive to offer as entertainment. It’s simply another mediocre heist flick with a couple of colorful characters. Even the main through line of Garfield’s resentment toward his father’s betrayal isn’t sustained for anything more than a few beats, and the big bad business subtheme is gratuitous at best. It’s hard to figure out just why this movie was made.

The Fall Guy is now playing in Tokyo at Toho Cinemas Nihonbashi (050-6868-5060), Toho Cinemas Hibiya (050-6868-5068), 109 Cinemas Premium Shinjuku (0570-060-109), Shinjuku Wald 9 (03-5369-4955), Shinjuku Piccadilly (050-6861-3011), Toho Cinemas Shinjuku (050-6868-5063), Toho Cinemas Shibuya (050-6868-5002), Toho Cinemas Roppongi Hills (050-6868-5024).

The Garfield Movie, in subtitled and dubbed versions, is now playing in Tokyo at Toho Cinemas Nihonbashi (050-6868-5060), Toho Cinemas Hibiya (050-6868-5068), Toho Cinemas Shinjuku (050-6868-5063), Toho Cinemas Roppongi Hills (050-6868-5024).

The Fall Guy home page in Japanese

The Garfield Movie home page in Japanese

The Fall Guy photo (c) 2024 Universal Studios