(Spoiler alert: spoilers ahead)
Usually the thrill of a Noir film is in its protagonist(s) constantly succeeding in escaping sticky situations. The Nice Guys manages to create an appeal out of seeing the protagonists constantly fail their way in and out of said situations. It's a nice play on formula that works because of how good the acting is.
Holland March (Ryan Gosling) is a private investigator who usually makes his living swindling the elderly out money on dead-end investigations. For example, when one of his clients asks him to find her niece, porn star Misty Mountains, March accepts even though the police have IDed Misty's dead body. Gosling's "search" leads him to a real search for missing person Amelia Kutner (Margaret Qualley), daughter of Justice Department director Judith Kutner (Kim Bassinger). Amelia hires enforcer Jackson Healy (Russell Crowe) to keep March off her trail; Healy first intimidates March out of the case; however, later when two hit men come after him in search of Amelia, Jackson convinces Holland and (to Holland's protest) his daughter Holly (Angourie Rice) to help him sniff out the situation. What follows is 90 minutes of the crew stumbling their way into uncovering a conspiracy that goes all the way to the top.
Ryan Gosling isn't just impressive in this movie - he's a complete revelation. We've seen him play the cool, calm, collected alpha male before, but this movie is a great showcase for his versatility. Gosling absolutely nails all of the slapstick comedy. He has impeccable timing, always letting the pain sink in for the right amount of time so that it's funny without overstaying its welcome; his facial expressions perfectly calibrated, switching from misguided optimism to shock and/or resignation at the drop of a hat. The scene where Holland tries to break into a bar by punching through the glass window, only to cut himself badly is a perfect example. Gosling starts with quixotic enthusiasm, punches the door, waits just long enough to freak out, and .sticks the landing (by not sticking the landing). Gosling builds up a thrill, allows the audience to experience the high, and injects the dose of reality right as the audience is coming down from said high. People assume this kind of physical comedy is easy, but it's not. The payoff is that The Nice Guys is really good at subverting some of the tropes of film noir. That kind of break-in is the kind of thing noir heroes often succeed at even though it should go exactly how it went for Holland. Gosling showed flashes of aptitude for slapstick in Crazy, Stupid Love but it's on full display here. I came into the movie knowing that he's a good actor, and came out of it convinced that he's a great actor.
Russell Crowe is the perfect yin to Gosling's yang. It's hard to imagine an actor better suited for Healy's brutish violence and sociopathy. Crowe's basically playing his real life persona. But the most delightful part of the movie is probably Angourie Rice as Holland's daughter Holly March. If Gosling puts on a clinic in slapstick humor, Rice is incredible with deadpan humor. If Rob Thomas ever decides to make Veronica Mars prequels, Rice should be his first call.
If there's a major theme of the movie, it's how much it hurts to be disappointed by our caretakers in life. Even when Holly bluntly declares Holland a terrible person and father, you can see in her face just how desperately she wants her words to be false - if we can't believe in our parents than who exactly can we believe in? Holly knows Jackson is a goon, but tries to get him to be better (by convincing him to incapacitate rather than kill his adversaries) in the hopes that he can fill even a small part of the father figure void her actual father can't hope to fill. The traditional parent/child dynamic is flipped on its head here, with Gosling and Rice emoting that frustration perfectly. Similarly, Amelia's predicament stems from her disillusionment at her own Mother's lack of convictions. And just like the Hollands and Healy get roped into Amelia's narrative, they get roped into her disillusionment - if the head of the Justice Department can't be trusted to protect the interests of the American people, than who do we have left? I'm not sure what the script looked like when it was originally pitched in 2014, but the parallels to the Flint water crisis are way too strong to be coincidental. We don't expect corporations to care about us, but we expect our elected leaders to have our back, which makes it all the more devastating when they stab said back instead. The best Holland and Jackson can do is come to peace with their small place in such a futile world.
As good as The Nice Guys is with slapstick comedy and witty banter, its plotting is pretty messy at best. Noir films typically work well when they peel away layers steadily; The Nice Guys gets caught up in manufacturing laughs, and almost forgets to reveal the actual mystery until doing so seemingly all at once at the end. This is a tradeoff that I was fine with, but ideally it would've been nice to get the best of crime and comedy. In a movie filled with a lot of really great acting, Kim Bassinger is completely sedate as Judith Kutner. There were some plot holes - like why March had such a great reputation as a PI, or why Holly had so much sympathy for people trying to kill her. The Nice Guys isn't terribly deep, but it's highly satisfying.
Grade: 7.5/10
