Ryan Gosling: Five Interesting Roles

 (hopefully people understand the above meme)

Ryan Gosling has recently experienced a bit of a renaissance (Ryanaissance?) (Barbie, The Fall Guy). I feel confident enough to say that I have been riding the Ryan Gosling hype train for quite a while - he was one of the first actors I actively thought ‘hmmm, I feel like I am witnessing good acting here’...and it was when I was watching Blade Runner 2049 in 2017. Since that pivotal moment, I am acutely aware that anything Ryan is in will be good. Truthfully, I haven’t seen everything he has been in. He has quite a varied filmography, his versatility displayed in the vastly different genre films, dramas, comedies and musicals he has starred in. I am yet to get to RG classics like The Place Beyond the Pines, The Gray Man and Lars and the Real Girl; I guess I am saving them as a treat for myself so I don’t run out of good Ryan content. Luckily, he seems booked and busy. Today, I feel like sharing some Ryan Gosling characters that have really stuck with me. They may not be the most iconic (sorry Ken from Barbie and the Driver from Drive) or well-loved (sorry Sebastian from La La Land and Noah from The Notebook) - I feel they have been spoken about so much and it’s time to shed some light on the more nuanced moments of Ryan’s career. (Granted, he is a very popular actor and I am certain most people have seen a lot of these). I think it is time to delve into the vulnerability, the adaptability and the comedy of Ryan Gosling as an actor.

The Nice Guys (2016) as Holland March

Starting off strong with a well-loved but often overlooked comedy starring Ryan Gosling and Russell Crowe - a good cop/bad cop shtick hidden amongst their on screen chemistry (read: bromance). Shane Black’s direction transports us back to the 70s, an era of questionable morals and good fashion. Ryan plays Holland March, an out of luck private eye who also happens to be a single dad to Angourie Rice’s Holly March (I never realised that father and daughter were Holland and Holly but I find that adorable now). This film highlights Ryan’s fantastic comedic timing and ability to scream very loudly. If you are thinking ‘wow this guy is funny in Barbie and The Fall Guy’ and you HAVEN’T seen this, drop everything now and seek it out. A sequel was discussed but never came to fruition. Oh Nice Guys, how special and sacred you are.

Half Nelson (2006) as Dan Dunne

Half Nelson is the story of a middle school teacher struggling with substance abuse and his personal relationships whilst also trying to connect to his students. Yeah, it’s not a particularly good situation to be in and you’ll find that most of Ryan’s roles are of this calibre - tragic. Dan Dunne is one of those performances that feels real (a speciality of Ryan’s) but one that feels particularly grounded in reality and true to a lot of people’s experiences. The quietness of this indie drama stands out to me in Ryan’s filmography (and is a far cry from the aforementioned Nice Guys). It’s almost something you’ve got to check twice that he’s in. With direction from Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck (who went on to direct 2019’s Captain Marvel interestingly), the entire film is shrouded in hope, despite its often hopeless tone, a balance that is very hard to execute. It's hard for me to write about this film as it is more something that needs to be experienced.  

The Believer (2001) as Danny Balint

This is an early role from Ryan and it is an intriguing film, loosely based on a true story about a Jewish man who becomes a neo-Nazi. I watched this a long time ago but still find myself thinking about it. Of course, religion and bigotry come into this story but it is mostly about identity. Ryan’s performance is subdued and unnerving. Letterboxd user CinemaClown put it best when describing Ryan’s performance as the driver of the story, a story that is ‘thought provoking, hard-hitting, powerfully disturbing yet eventually moving’. I am yet to find anyone I know who has actually seen this. It won the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance Film Festival in 2001, I wonder how it would do now.

First Man (2018) as Neil Armstrong

No one saw this at the movies (I don't think I even did). There was controversy surrounding the lack of American flag. And apparently that made people not go and see it! And when people bring up good space movies and good Ryan Gosling movies, they always fail to bring this up! And I am secretly very happy about that because it feels like something just for me. Fatherhood is a theme for Ryan in a few of his movies. This movie actually isn’t about space and it isn’t about the moon landing (in my opinion anyway). It is about grief and the way we cope with it. It is about fatherhood and the consequences of it. It is about being there for family but struggling to find the courage to be there. Ryan’s performance is reserved, it is quiet. It stands out to me amongst his other roles - instead of going for the classic biopic, ‘I need to impress people with my skills by yelling or crying intensely and get nominated for an Oscar’ vibe, he picks up the pieces of Armstrong’s life, the life of an important person historically, as if they were pieces of any ordinary man, a man who has personal, inner conflict that he doesn’t let anyone intrude on, not in 1969, not even now. There is a lot of emotional intelligence to this performance and this movie in general. There are so many biopics out there, but when I watch this one, I find myself thinking of my family, and not the moon landing. And then I spend the rest of the night in tears thinking about this movie making me think of that.

Blade Runner 2049 (2017) as K

I’m ending my interesting Ryan Gosling moments with the one that started it all: Blade Runner 2049. My first time at the cinema going ‘huh, I guess this is acting, I guess this is cinema, this is emotion.' This movie floored me in a way no cinema experience really has. And because it was the first time, it was important. I love sci-fi films but nothing has ever stuck as much as Denis Villeneuve’s sequel to the 1982 classic. I found myself thinking about the ending of this film recently, I felt myself overcome with emotion. K as a character is a capable individual, but yearning for connection. His sense of self is in the hands of Harrison Ford’s Deckard. When that identity is thwarted and destroyed, we understand that maybe it never mattered anyway, that aspect of his existence. It’s Ryan’s ability to evoke such longing and such acceptance, even on K’s death bed, in a way that feels relatively normal, where the character feels perfectly serene and comfortable in his situation, that makes everything about this character so moving to me. 

You’ll find that a lot in Ryan performances, a self-awareness that spreads itself into the layers of the film he’s in, into the other characters on screen (yes, even in Barbie). His characters tend to elevate other elements of the film. I completely understand why he is often chosen as a lead in films that have many layers to story and characters. Ryan is layering that shit up!