While its box office performance thus far may leave something to be desired, The Fall Guy serves as the unofficial kickoff to the 2024 summer movie season. Between the energetic performances by Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt, a surprisingly hilarious supporting turn from Aaron Taylor-Johnson, and a number of the year’s best action sequences, The Fall Guy should more than satisfy cinephiles looking for escapist entertainment. However, The Fall Guy is also a love letter to the movie industry that sheds light on the underrepresented work of stunt artists.

Although stylistically it contains allusions to the noir genre, The Fall Guy contains references to many iconic action movies. It offers an amusing behind-the-scenes look at the production of a highly anticipated summer blockbuster, satirizing how trailers, promotional appearances, and marketing affect the release of upcoming films. Cinephiles may enjoy spotting the references, as The Fall Guy is clearly inspired by a different generation of action cinema. Here are ten great movies to watch if you loved The Fall Guy.

10 ‘Lethal Weapon’ (1987)

Directed by Richard Donner

One of the greatest strengths of The Fall Guy is that it perfectly blends comedy and drama; while the jokes at the expense of Hollywood celebrities are quite uproarious, there’s a genuine romanticism within the relationship between Colt (Gosling) and Jodie (Blunt). Lethal Weapon perfected the action-comedy formula by combining humorous non-sequiturs with serious action. While Riggs (Mel Gibson) and Murtaugh (Danny Glover) are often at each other’s throats, they eventually reveal themselves to be genuinely caring about each other.

Lethal Weapon perfected the “buddy cop” movie formula, and its influence sneaks its way into The Fall Guy. It may primarily be a romance, but The Fall Guy offers some fun comedic banter when Colt teams up with Winston Duke’s character Dan Tucker, a stunt coordinator who becomes roped into the criminal conspiracy. In these scenes, The Fall Guy adds some snappy dialogue that feels reminiscent of Shane Black’s work on Lethal Weapon.

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9 ‘Die Hard’ (1988)

Directed by John McTiernan

Die Hard is known as the film that kicked off the modern action craze, as Bruce Willis’ performance as John McClane embodied everything that viewers wanted out of a summer movie protagonist. Gosling’s performance in The Fall Guy is very reminiscent of McClane, as they are both cheeky characters who are forced into dangerous circumstances through sheer bad luck. No one delivers one-liners quite like Willis, but Gosling does get more than a few memorable quips in The Fall Guy. The Fall Guy’s climactic action sequence does bear a strong resemblance to the infamous Nakatomi Plaza set piece in Die Hard.

Both The Fall Guy and Die Hard succeed because their heroes are underdogs, and both are motivated by romance. As a result, the audience has reason to invest in seeing Colt and McClane succeed and prove themselves “worthy” of being in a relationship.

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8 ‘True Lies’ (1994)

Directed by James Cameron

While The Fall Guy has no shortage of great action, its surprisingly the romance between Colt and Jodie that makes the film so entertaining; both characters discover that they’re much more successful when they’re working together. James Cameron’s action classic True Lies perfectly intertwines a romantic comedy subplot within an espionage storyline. The chemistry between Arnold Schwarzengger and Jamie Lee Curtis allowed both stars to showcase a very different side of their personalities.

Although the commentary on marital dysfunction is surprisingly earnest, True Lies contains some vehicular action that The Fall Guy clearly took inspiration from. The incorporation of a climactic helicopter fight at the end of The Fall Guy is a touching reference to the groundbreaking set piece that Cameron pulled off back in 1994. It’s impressive that three decades later, True Lies still sets the standard for what an exciting third act battle should look like.

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7 ‘Speed’ (1994)

Directed by Jan de Bont

While it goes in depth exploring how action filmmakers hone their craft, The Fall Guy is surprisingly gritty in its depiction of what stunts look like in the real world. Speed set a new standard for summer action movies by presenting a plausible scenario; trying to get passengers off of a high speed bus target by a rogue terrorist (Dennis Hopper) was an ingenious premise that proved difficult to replicate. Unsurprisingly, Speed was a “lightning in a bottle” sensation, as its disappointing sequel Speed 2: Cruise Control became one of the worst films of 1997.

Both Speed and The Fall Guy understand the importance of having an intelligent protagonist. While both Colt and Jack (Keanu Reeves) have been in their fair share of gun battles, they end up winning the day by outsmarting and deceiving their opponents. Gosling certainly captures some of the grizzled charisma that Reeves made so iconic.

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6 ‘Bowfinger’ (1999)

Directed by Frank Oz

The Fall Guy may be an action movie first and foremost, but it’s also a hilarious satire of the eccentric personalities involved in major Hollywood productions. The 1999 classic comedy Bowfinger explored the eccentric nature of movie stars with a story about the B-movie producer Bobby (Steve Martin) and the eccentric method actor Kit Ramsey (Eddie Murphy). While The Fall Guy explored the shady side of Hollywood action movies, Bowfinger explored the challenges of getting highly egocentric actors to invest in their characters.

Both The Fall Guy and Bowfinger are perfectly suited for cinephiles because they feature recreations of fictional movies. While The Fall Guy contains references to the various films that Tom Ryder (Taylor-Johnson) has appeared in over the course of his career, Bowfinger includes footage of the real “dream project” that Bobby makes when he’s given the resources to make his passion project.

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5 ‘The Bourne Identity’ (2002)

Directed by Doug Liman

While its allusions to action classics are perhaps too frequent to mention, The Fall Guy name drops The Bourne Identity when discussing the history of onscreen fighting. The reference isn’t surprising, as The Bourne Identity initiated a new era of action cinema that featured more realistic on screen combat. While the action films of the 1990s tended to be more over-the-top and comedic, The Bourne Identity presented a grounded narrative following Jason Bourne (Matt Damon) as he attempted to unravel the conspiracy of the Treadstone program.

Both The Fall Guy and The Bourne Identity subverted the action genre by incorporating mystery elements. In The Fall Guy, Colt’s search for Ryder ends up exposing the cover up of an enigmatic murder; in The Bourne Identity, Jason discovers that he was part of a top secret program which may explain why his memories have been erased.

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4 ‘Miami Vice’ (2006)

Directed by Michael Mann

The Fall Guy references Miami Vice when discussing Colt’s past work, suggesting that he got his start in the industry by working as a stunt man on the classic television show. While the stylized 1980s series changed network television forever, Michael Mann’s 2006 feature film is a deeply misunderstood masterpiece that pioneered digital filmmaking techniques. By placing the over-the-top world of Miami’s criminal underworld in a tactile and realistic environment, Mann created an atmospheric noir that addressed the futility of the war on drugs and the notion of sensitive masculinity.

The Fall Guy contains many visual allusions to Miami Vice, particularly during a boat chase that resembles a similar sequence involving Sonny Crockett (Colin Farrell). Both Miami Vice and The Fall Guy seek to flesh out their original source material with more depth and nuance; The Fall Guy inspired by a classic television series of the same name starring Lee Majors.

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3 ‘The Man From U.N.C.L.E.’ (2015)

Directed by Guy Ritchie

With its mix of snarky dialogue, clever needle drops, and heist-oriented action sequences, The Fall Guy feels more than a little indebted to the films of Guy Ritchie. Ritchie’s 2005 spy caper The Man From U.N.C.L.E. was also based on a classic television series, and followed the American spy Napoleon Solo (Henry Cavill) and the Soviet Union agent Illya Kuryakin (Armie Hammer) as they teamed up to face a nuclear threat. Like The Fall Guy, The Man From U.N.C.L.E. is a love letter to a “classical era” of genre storytelling, which makes it all the more unfortunate that it never spawned a sequel.

Like The Fall Guy, The Man From U.N.C.L.E. benefits from the use of stylized filmmaking techniques that make the action scenes more dynamic. Ritchie utilizes point-of-view shots, split screens, and non-linear framing devices to make the film’s heist sequences more enthralling.

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2 ‘The Nice Guys’ (2016)

Directed by Shane Black

While he started off his career making more serious films like Drive and Half Nelson, Gosling showed in The Fall Guy that he has serious talents as a physical comedian. The Nice Guys features one of Gosling’s funniest performances to date as the incompetent private detective Holland March, who is forced to team up with the brutal enforcer Jackson Healy (Russell Crowe) to solve the disappearance of an adult film star. While it sadly didn’t spawn a sequel, The Nice Guys’ quotable dialogue and snarky characters have endeared it as a modern cult classic.

Both The Fall Guy and The Nice Guys are entertaining due to their satirical depiction of the film industry, revealing the entertainment world to be much more hostile than it looks from an outsider’s perspective. While The Fall Guy examined the chaos of a modern film production, The Nice Guys examined the seedy underbelly of Los Angeles adult entertainment in the 1970s.

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1 ‘Bullet Train’ (2022)

Directed by David Leitch

As good as Gosling and Blunt are in The Fall Guy, the film succeeds thanks to Leitch’s terrific direction of the action sequences. It should come as no surprise, as Leitch’s action thriller Bullet Train proved he could intertwine mystery, comedy, and suspense into the ideal summer blockbuster. Led by a terrific cast that includes Taylor-Johnson in another scene sterling role, Bullet Train centers on a group of enigmatic assassins who come into conflict with each other on a chaotic train ride across Japan.

Leitch’s experience as a stuntman is evident, as both The Fall Guy and Bullet Train include impressive sequences of hand-to-hand combat. A brutal brawl between Tangerine (Talyor-Johnson) and Ladybug (Brad Pitt) in Bullet Train was a standout moment that clearly influenced the fight between Colt and the sword-wielding Iggy Starr (Teresa Palmer) in The Fall Guy.

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