Just Plain Fun Movies — The Fall Guy

Fresh off an almost career-ending accident, stuntman Colt Seavers has to track down a missing movie star, solve a conspiracy and try to win back the love of his life while still doing his day job.

This has a slow start but once it gets going it never slows down. It is such a clever and funny homage to action movies, from the many references dropped to the way the soundtrack features the songs up front and loud. As always, main attraction Ryan Gosling is wonderful. I would watch him read the phone book.

It wasn't perfect. There is that slow start. Emily Blount is, for me, always unremarkable. A stronger female star was needed to provide a spark strong enough to match Gosling and the script in general. The script could have used another pass to clean up the main storyline but all the asides and references made it great fun to watch. 

However, those are small quibbles. Overall The Fall Guy is just a great popcorn movie.

Just Plain Fun — The Lost City

Reclusive author Loretta Sage writes about exotic places in her popular adventure novels that feature a handsome cover model named Alan. While on tour promoting her new book with Alan, Loretta gets kidnapped by an eccentric billionaire who hopes she can lead him to the ancient city’s lost treasure that featured in her latest story. Alan, determined to prove he can be a hero in real life and not just on the pages of her books, sets off to rescue her.

This movie had mixed reviews and I've never been a fan of either Sandra Bullock or Channing Tatum. So I ignored it until I came across a positive review from Scott's Self-Indulgent Movie Blog which summed up:

Behind charming lead performances and an upbeat message, The Lost City is a fun as hell romantic action comedy.

We watched this for our family movie night and all of us really had a great time. It's a solid comedy that is an homage to Romancing the Stone, while being completely different. Very funny and a lot of fun. Also, Brad Pitt's part showed why he should do more comedy.

Just Plain Fun: Confess, Fletch; Honor Among Thieves; and Game Night

 Sometimes you just want to watch a fun movie that doesn't give you more than a good time. We recently saw three of them that were just plain fun and, as my mother said, silly in just the right way. They also strike me as highly rewatchable. I look forward to doing so.

Confess, Fletch

The roguishly charming and endlessly troublesome Fletch becomes the prime suspect in a murder case while searching for a stolen art collection. The only way to prove his innocence? Find out which of the long list of suspects is the culprit - from the eccentric art dealer and a missing playboy to a crazy neighbor and Fletch’s Italian girlfriend. Crime, in fact, has never been this disorganized.

This is a solid murder mystery like they don't make any more. Extremely entertaining, quick witted, funny, and keeps you guessing. Also, we need more Jon Hamm in humorous roles.

Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves

A charming thief and a band of unlikely adventurers undertake an epic heist to retrieve a lost relic, but things go dangerously awry when they run afoul of the wrong people. Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves brings the rich world and playful spirit of the legendary roleplaying game to the big screen in a hilarious and action-packed adventure. It's an infectiously good-spirited comedy with a solid emotional core.

This captured the sense of the gameplaying while also being a good fantasy adventure movie for any viewer. As a Baldur's Gate game player it was distinctly weird to recognize town names and city buildings and spells and suchlike. 

You know the basic beats of who will grow in what way and what sorts of personal challenges they must face. But that frees you up to sit back and enjoy the show, letting the humor and quests take you on a very entertaining ride.

Game Night

Max and Annie's weekly game night gets kicked up a notch when Max's brother Brooks arranges a murder mystery party -- complete with fake thugs and federal agents. So when Brooks gets kidnapped, it's all supposed to be part of the game. As the competitors set out to solve the case, they start to learn that neither the game nor Brooks are what they seem to be. The friends soon find themselves in over their heads as each twist leads to another unexpected turn over the course of one chaotic night.

After watching Honor Among Thieves we discovered that the same team wrote and directed Game Night, which somehow I'd missed when it came out. This is another movie where the only goal is to entertain, which it does spectacularly.

The type of movie is familiar so we could relax and go along for the ride, enjoying the twists on the familiar beats. There were so many familiar, favorite actors that it was the icing on the cake to have both Jason Bateman and Kyle Chandler in the film together. And it was really fun to see Chandler playing against type.

A Movie You Might Have Missed #76 — All of Me (1984)

It's been 11 years since I began this series highlighting movies I wished more people knew about. I'm rerunning it from the beginning because I still think these are movies you might have missed.

A screwball comedy that should be better known.

Rich, eccentric Edwina Cutwater  (Lily Tomlin) plans to transport her soul into the body of a beautiful young woman. But it goes wrong. And Edwina's soul has accidentally taken over the entire right side of her lawyer, Roger Cobb (Steve Martin). He still controls what's left. Now, Edwina and Roger are living together in the same body. He's losing his job. He's losing his girlfriend. And he just can't seem to get her out of his system. No matter how hard he tries.

Movie Tagline

"All of Me" shares with a lot of great screwball comedies a very simple approach: Use absolute logic in dealing with the absurd. Begin with a nutty situation, establish the rules, and follow them. The laughs happen when ordinary human nature comes into conflict with ridiculous developments.

Roger Ebert

I'd forgotten just how funny this movie is. We saw this in theaters when it came out and I remembered the big plot points. However, I hadn't seen it for many years so that details of the physical comedy, timing, and the witty screenplay made me laugh out loud. In fact, we were all laughing out loud, which was a lovely way to begin the weekend.

This celebrates not only Steve Martin's acting but merges that with his gift for physical comedy in a way that really works. This really also benefits from the sharp comedic timing of Martin, Tomlin and director Carl Reiner.

The "life after death" theme and humor could put this into loosely into the same category as Ghostbusters if you want a light, non-scary Halloween movie. Though, of course, it is more about living than dying.

A Movie You Might Have Missed #8 — Kiss, Kiss, Bang, Bang

It's been 10 years since I began this series highlighting movies I wished more people knew about. I'm rerunning it from the beginning because I still think these are movies you might have missed.

8. Kiss, Kiss, Bang, Bang

A film that mocks film noir cliches while at the same time being a very satisfying mystery/action/buddy noir-ish film in its own right.

Robert Downey Jr. is a small-time thief who stumbles into an acting audition when on the lam from the cops. He aces the audition and is sent to Hollywood where he soon finds himself neck-deep in a murder mystery involving his childhood sweetheart. While shadowing detective Val Kilmer to learn more about his acting role, Downey Jr. becomes heavily involved in a second mystery as well.

Great fun, with fast-talking dialogue that will keep you on your toes. A nice companion piece to Brick; though completely different in feel, both movies mimic noir style while still standing on their own two legs.