Netflix’s The Gray Man is the latest from Joe and Anthony Russo (Marvel’s Captain America: Civil War, Avengers: Endgame, and more) and an adaptation of the 2009 novel of the same name by Mark Greaney. And it is also a return to the Russo Bros. in what they do best: political thrillers. While movies like Cherry worked for me, The Gray Man is more in line with their comedic timing and fight sequences that we’ve come to know and love them for, and it’s a great marriage between the two sides of Ryan Gosling’s action career that just work.
Gosling is known for a wide range of roles, but my favorite performances from him come from things like The Nice Guys and Drive, and The Gray Man gives him an opportunity to play in the “gray” area between those two films, and it works so beautifully for the story that screenwriters Joe Russo, Christopher Markus, and Stephen McFeely put together.
The conflict of The Gray Man comes from the kidnapping of Claire (Julia Butters) and Six’s (Ryan Gosling) determination to get her back, because of their shared history when he protected her as a member of the CIA’s “Sierra team.” It gives the story heart on a wild journey from start to finish that is only highlighted by how brilliant its cast is.
Action Ryan Gosling
You probably know Ryan Gosling from something completely different than the person next to you. I grew up a kid of the 90s/early 2000s so I remember Remember the Titans and seeing Gosling there, so my idea of where he shines isn’t exactly the first thing I’ve seen him in or even my favorite thing he’s done. I love his performance in nearly everything he’s been in, and I don’t think there’s a Ryan Gosling movie that I don’t enjoy. What works about The Gray Man is that it seems as if the script really knows how to highlight the comedic talents of Gosling with his action-star ways (much like The Nice Guys did, but much more brutal), and it plays nicely in the story overall.
Gosling plays Six, a member of the Sierra team who was originally in jail and recruited by Fitz (Billy Bob Thorton) into the Sierra program. He operates as a “gray” man, which means the CIA can call him in to do their work when they can’t officially act as agents. But when Denny Carmichael (Regé-Jean Page) wants to get rid of the program, he does so by having the agents killed off—which becomes a problem where Six is involved.
Six’s real name is Court Gentry, and throughout the movie, he is slowly forced to realize who he can and cannot trust. But as I said before, it’s a mix of Gosling’s comedic action role in The Nice Guys with the brutal fight styles of his film Drive because Six isn’t someone you want to be on the wrong side of. And we get to see some of those sequences really shine in his fights with Chris Evans’ Lloyd Hansen.
Sinister Chris Evans
Lloyd Hansen is a linen pant and loafer-wearing murderer. Yes, I don’t get it, but I’m into it. Lloyd is essentially someone who just does whatever he wants, and because he has the protection of the CIA, he gets away with it. He also sort of operates in the gray area, but he’s not a member of the Sierra team. He did go to Harvard with Carmichael, though, so when Carmichael needs something done, he calls Lloyd, which is how he gets involved with finding Six. Six is given files on Carmichael that he “shouldn’t” have, and it results in this chase to get to Six.
Lloyd’s energy is, well, a frat boy-turned-murderer. And it works because his entire deal is that he went to Harvard … to play football. But Evans’ sinister turn as Lloyd only enhances Gosling’s dry sense of humor and annoyance at having to fight to get away from everyone.
Ana de Armas can take us all out
One of the CIA agents that ends up helping Six is Ana de Armas’ Dani. She’s with him on the mission when he learns all about the information that Carmichael wants to keep hidden, and she slowly starts to see what the CIA is doing to Six and helps him when she doesn’t really have a chance of helping herself. What works about their dynamic is that Dani saves Six over and over again, and he even makes a quip about how he’ll have to save her at one point, but even then, she’s still the one who keeps saving him.
She’s a badass, and de Armas plays her in a way that you believe everything she’s doing. We believe that she can take getting thrown around and get back up and fight through her own pain to make sure that they get to Claire. And seeing Dani and how she isn’t ready and willing to fight with Six, no question, is fascinating.
Regé-Jean Page and Jessica Henwick
On the flip of Six and Dani is Carmichael and Suzanne (Jessica Henwick). The two are working in the CIA and went to college at Harvard with Lloyd, and when Carmichael gets in too deep in this mission, Suzanne is left to clean up the mess, and she’s not perfect but she’s so constantly been sidelined by her “friends” that you understand her frustration and her determination to fix this to save herself.
Henwick holds her own in scenes against Evans’ Lloyd that really highlight just how much she hated going to school with him and being associated with him.
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The Gray Man is the kind of action movie we’ve come to love from the Russos and a great time—especially if you love Gosling and Evans just throwing one-liners at each other while getting stabbed, shot, punched, and thrown into cars.
(featured image: Netflix)
