The fun of a movie like “The Nice Guys” is watching the lead actors have fun. Writer/director Shane Black uses the conventional bird-in-the-hand of the L.A. detective story and gets his worth with his two birds- crow and gosling- in the proverbial twisted, tangled bush of an unraveling mystery. Russell Crowe and Ryan Gosling have such good chemistry together that, watching them strut to the film’s ‘70’s vibe, their fun is as contagious as the avian flu.
It’s a stereotypical set-up: an alcoholic, ex-cop turned gutter-scraping gumshoe Holland March (Gosling) is hired to find a missing porn star and winds up on the trail of another girl named Amelia (Margaret Qualley). Amelia, knowing March is looking for her, employs muscle-for-hire Jackson Healy (Crowe) to visit him and literally beat sense into March to give up the search. After Healy successfully dissuades March by fracturing his arm, Healy is visited by two thugs (Keith David and Beau Knapp) who are also looking for Amelia and are willing to break Healy apart for information. Thwarting the thugs’ attempt, Healy returns to March and offers him money to continue searching for Amelia. Begrudgingly teamed together to find out what key Amelia holds to a value worth violence, Healy and March begin to slide down the seedy, slippery slope synonymous with any detective story and discover the roots of the mystery are buried deep within the blackest of soils.
For those familiar with Shane Black’s work as the screenwriter behind “Lethal Weapon” and “The Last Boy Scout,” “The Nice Guys” offers more of the same black humor laced within the teaming of reluctant partners out to crack a case filled with action-filled mayhem. However, what sets “Nice Guys” apart is Crowe and Gosling freewheeling in a time when freewheeling was the fashion. In the time before AIDS and the Internet, the film being set in 1977 offers Crowe (decked out in a loose-fitting leisure suit to drape his bulk) and Gosling (chain-smoking in shirts with bad prints) the chance to roll through La-La land with the abandon that the times dictated. As any detective story worth its salt revolves around sex and money, when Healy and March find the road leads through the underground porn industry and the money behind the mystery buys a barrage of bad guys out to stop them as they move closer to the truth, Crowe and Gosling take full advantage of the comic opportunities.
Crowe and Gosling’s pairing in “Nice Guys” intentionally calls to mind famous comedic pairs from the past, namely Abbott & Costello and Laurel & Hardy. It’s a gamble that pays off through both actors’ charm: Crowe as the silent straight-man (like Abbott or Hardy); Gosling recreating Costello’s breathless stammering shock at discovering a dead body or emitting Laurel’s high-piercing shriek when confronting danger. To the film’s credit, it’s not overdone and Gosling’s particularly good in the physical comedy he’s asked to perform. Also, “Nice Guys” features some great violence-induced sight gags that are truly inspired.
Given the stereotypical trappings of a detective story and the film’s violent nature, “The Nice Guys” is better because of Crowe and Gosling- they allow you to join in their fun as they spread their comedic wings.