Set in 1977 and filled with all the classic style and music of the era, we find two P.I. types who end up working on the same case. Russell Crowe and Ryan Gosling play the mostly hapless and often lucky guns for hire. The Nice Guys reminded me a bit of the failed FOX TV Show The Good Guys, except that show was about a couple of losers who were cops.
We open up with a kid reading a porno mag, featuring Misty Mountains. Moments later, Misty crashes through the wall and dies in the kid’s backyard. She was naked and the little boy is kind enough to cover her with his nightshirt. And he’s pretty much it for positive male role models.
Our two heroes are thugs, drunks, and occasionally murderers. The Nice Guys still has a lot of funny moments. Many of them are pure slapstick, such as when Crowe casually assaults everyone he meets. Another fun moment is when Gosling’s 13 year old daughter tries to hire Crowe to beat up a classmate she doesn’t like. The daughter is the stereotypical stable force in the fucked up parent’s life who helps the two losers solve the many problems they face fighting the evil forces of Detroit.
Oh yeah, the bad guys in the film are Detroit’s Big Three, a force so powerful that no one can ever hope to stop them. This gag is like having your villian sail off on the Titanic as the credits roll.
Among the many off things in The Nice Guys is when the 13 year old daughter hangs out at a party straight out of Boogie Nights and watches a porn movie with one of it’s stars. Another odd moment was when Ryan Gosling spends several minutes doing an impression of Lou Costello. It seemed a bit out of place in this violent and brutal film about the murder of a porn star.
The closing scene gives the impression that this was going to be a series of films, but since this turkey cost $50 million to make and has only brought in $57 million, I doubt that will happen.
Like other big budget flops, the acting, sets, music, etc were all very good. But the STORY SUCKED! These two losers are LOSERS! I never cared if they caught the killers or if they themselves were finially caught by the cops. Nothing in the story mattered.
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