MIDNIGHT REVIEWS Top 5 Shane Black Movies
Midnight Reviews features reviews and thought pieces written and edited by a parent, at night, after bedtime.
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Whilst writing my list of alternative Christmas movies, I really got to thinking about what makes a Christmas movie, a Christmas movie.
Is it the message the story has? Could a film conceivably be set in the height of summer, without a piece of decoration or wrapped gift in sight, and still be called a Christmas movie? I think most would disagree.
Can it be a Christmas movie purely because it’s set at Christmas? Some argue, so that they can stick on a particular favourite, that it can be a Christmas movie simply because there’s snow in it (Batman Begins: An Argument for Christmas with Christian (Bale), an essay put forth for review late 2009).
It’s a complicated question with no answer in sight, despite various brave souls who thought they could step forward and provide an answer for us all, before collapsing into the fire, sacrificing themselves so that we may have but a chance of garnering more knowledge about ourselves.
Anyway, here are Shane Black’s top five movies.
5. The Long Kiss Goodnight (1996)
Black’s role: writer and producer
A tale of conspiracy with a pair of A-list stars, something that crops up often in Shane Black’s work. Samuel L Jackson is the private detective here, with Geena Davis as the excessively pulpy ‘character who has amnesia.’ Both the performances and the script suffuse each character with wit and toughness beyond two dimensions, however, meaning the film is inherently watchable if only for them and the runtime never feels excessive. Despite the presence of guns, explosions and the like in most of his movies, Shane Black writes characters we’d be happy watching doing everyday things and this is the prime reason great actors want to work with his scripts.
But it’s not just these two waiting at a bus stop. The script is smart, funny and full of excitement with a mystery that keeps you guessing until a reveal that is just the right amount of barmy, but the writing overall lacks the specific aim or direction that the other entries on this list are able to maintain.
Ultimately it’s a highly enjoyable experience if you are a Shane Black fan. This could be one to discover if you’ve already seen the more well-known entries and are looking for something else for Christmas.
4. Iron Man 3 (2013)
Shane Black’s role: writer and director
Shane Black and Robert Downey Jr. reunite after Kiss Kiss Bang Bang and it’s so good to see that not only are they onboard, but everyone else is as well.
It’s standard MCU stuff at first, with Iron Man tasked with taking down the villainous Mandarin, who has caused explosions and the deaths of dozens of people we don’t know but certainly hear about on TV.
But after some light Shane Black-isms (undercutting the opening of the movie with Blue (Da Ba Dee); having Happy Hogan grow some awful hair so he looks like a Vincent Vega cosplayer) we really get stuck in after Tony Stark’s house gets destroyed. Jarvis, or J.A.R.V.I.S. because he’s an artificial intelligence, is suddenly not so all-knowing and one only wishes they followed through with an entire scene of him saying the wrong cranberries.
We get a buddy comedy in miniature as Stark teams up with a young inventor (who later turns up in The Nice Guys). The chemistry between the two is great to witness and the near-constant back and forth is witty and simultaneously eye-opening when it comes to showing Stark without the protection of his Iron Man suit. He is open and raw and needs that time to recover. Iron Man 3 showing the very human side of a character who in the previous instalment seemed to be merely the set protagonist in a very unfocused story.
I could write about the Mandarin reveal as an entire article on its own, so here it can just get a summary: it’s a scene chock-full of exposition, but is easily the most entertaining scene of an extremely overstuffed movie. It’s a sign of the playfulness that’s to come from the MCU with things like WandaVision, a playfulness that would be wonderful to go back to instead of what we get now (“The multiverse provides endless possibilities. Look, these two characters are meeting in a way that’s wholly perfunctory!”)
It’s a scene that proves Marvel aren’t afraid to mock themselves amongst the more serious backstories and snaps. In a way, it also proves why Shane Black and Marvel were not such a mismatched duo after all.
3. Lethal Weapon (1987)
Shane Black’s role: writer
This is where it all began. At least according to Black’s IMDb page.
In this one, as with quite a few of Shane Black’s efforts, we have a pairing of detectives, or detective-sorts, who are mismatched to each other but ultimately not the case they’re investigating. We have quite a broken individual in Mel Gibson’s Riggs, and while everyone remembers the crazy eyes and the jumping and the shooting, Gibson does also give a very effective straight performance of someone struggling through grief, not going for the laughs in the scene where he bites down on a gun and is an inch away from saying goodbye to everybody.
But when he does start tearing it up around town, Danny Glover is pure wide-eyed brilliance as Murtaugh. He’s a guy who knows how many days until his retirement and he is not putting up with Riggs, not one day more of it and Glover gleefully takes turns with Gibson, swapping roles between straight man and the funny one.
Tearing extremely close to anarchy, with Mel Gibson and Danny Glover fully onboard the entire way, Lethal Weapon is also incredibly ludicrous. If it slowed down, you might realise how absurd it is. Fortunately, it doesn’t ever really take its foot off the accelerator.
It hasn’t aged perfectly, what with being the archetype for mismatched cop movies as opposed to the rip-roaring cool kid it was when it came out. And Eric Clapton’s contribution to the score has aged worse than Gibson’s mullet. But Lethal Weapon still provides the shocks and the spills that can keep a Christmas, or any time of year, entertaining.
2. The Nice Guys (2016)
Shane Black’s role: writer and director
We lean into Shane Black’s more cartoony mannerisms with his third directorial effort. We start with a car barrelling down the Hollywood Hills before careening through the walls of a house, all as a young kid attempts to break into his dad’s collection of dirty magazines. This could be the clip they use if anyone asks ‘What are Shane Black films like?’
What follows is the odd couple pairing of Ryan Gosling and Russell Crowe being forced together to find a girl, along the way being pushed and pulled into all sorts of shenanigans that it’s sometimes hard to keep track, not so much of who’s who, but sometimes why they’re doing that thing.
While tons of people were surprised with Ryan Gosling’s turn in Barbie, anyone who was already a fan of this movie knew he had the silly comedy chops along with the more dramatic side. Can you believe the guy who played Ken was also in Blue Valentine? Gosling here is what can now be identified as the quintessential Shane Black character: muddling through life a little, in need of some help, using quips and a deadpan delivery to cover up insecurities and a broken heart. Oh, and also he’s a private detective.
Somehow Gosling finds the line I never knew existed: the line between too much screaming and not enough. But as funny as Ryan Gosling playing one of the three stooges is, the funnier material comes with the deadpan and it’s in these moments the film really shines. Shane Black’s stock-in-trade isn’t explosions or even (whisper it) Christmas private eyes, it’s characters trying to come up with something to say as they’re saying it. “We’re currently doing it the easy way.”
Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (2005)
Shane Black’s role: writer and director
A hilarious take on the private eye sub-genre. As soon as the opening titles fade in, after the smart, biting prologue, you are set up for what’s in store. All of the great movies I’ve seen do this — they set their stall out early and let the audience in on what they’re going to do. With Kiss Kiss Bang Bang you know you’re in for a movie that is going to be acerbic and a little dark, but mixed with a light hearted touch that will help you feel warm and fuzzy in the end. It’s a double shot of good rum at a party that’s fun, but not too intense.
It’s a Christmas movie, but it also lets us know that this is a world that’s a little off-kilter. In the middle of winter we cut to a pool party, women in Christmas swim suits gently doing laps as we, like Harry Lockhart, are a little on edge and unsure what to think of this damn place.
Like most of Black’s movies, it’s easy to see why great actors flock to work with him, because in spite of the plot being almost unimportant there is so much great dialogue and character relationship material to work with.
With a voice as unique as Black’s you have to be, as mentioned before, completely onboard and everyone here is. Downey Jr. is amazing and broken and cowering as Harry Lockhart, a guy built to just muddle through life and is therefore the perfect character for this situation.
His character, and the movie, can be summed up in the scene where Harry unintentionally kills a henchman whilst muddling through his own version of Russian Roulette. Val Kilmer as the stuck-up professional who’s too good for this shit is also excellent. Michelle Monaghan as Harmony Faith Lane gives it everything, giving Harry the run-around until she fully realises they’re on the same team (and when they do team up, it is majestic, sad and nostalgic; like most old unrequited fairy tale romances).
It is such a fantastic mixture of deadpan and comedy; when we see Kilmer’s character in danger, we realise we’re not sat there watching a Looney Tunes character who’s going to be fine in the next scene, but in fact we pine and hope that he does pull through. And of course when he does, it’s treated in such a flippant way that it comes close, this close, to being something from a cartoon, perhaps in a way that a lot of Shane Black’s material does. None of Black’s material is of this world; it’s of the world of cinema, with bad guys with guns and unknowing, little people just hoping they can get through the day without the bad guys doing something bad to them. And the good guys who give it their best shot.
Something extra: Predator (1987)
Shane Black’s role: actor and rumoured script doctor
No, it’s not a Christmas movie in any way (being together? Giving and receiving… death? There are lots of trees!) But I couldn’t talk about Shane Black films without mentioning Predator. The behind the scenes stories about this movie are intense, including widespread illness amongst the crew, an actor hired to play an alien who allegedly complained about only appearing in the film as the alien (?) and Carl Weathers hiding from people at the gym. That this movie got made at all speaks to both the perseverance and ingenuity of the cast and crew.
Shane Black’s onscreen role is minor, killed early on by the title character, but his role as potential writer is more interesting. Both Empire and The Hollywood Reporter have excellent pieces on the making of the film as a whole, and according to the latter Black was only brought onboard as an actor because of how impressed everyone was with Black’s script for Lethal Weapon. The story goes that Black refused to polish the script for Predator, so his character was killed off quickly as presumably producer John Davis had no need for Black to stick around.
Whatever the true story, this would be my first suggestion for anyone at Christmas who doesn’t want a Christmas movie. In fact, it’d be one of my first suggestions for any time of year. Screw keeping the Christmas theme of this list going. What starts as a typical action movie, full to the brim with buff guys running round doing buff things like tying ropes and throwing knives, turns into a horrific science-fiction movie that gets to have its cake and eat it too. If you haven’t seen it, check it out before reading through some of the verified behind the scenes stories. Both the movie and these stories are as exhilarating as each other.
Most, if not all, of these movies are available to stream or purchase and if not, then they should be.
Do you agree with my list? Have any thoughts you’d like to share? Please, feel free, and share this article around if you’d like!
