On this latest episode of Adjust Your Tracking, my co-host Joe von Appen, who’s something of a Shane Black scholar, gets to impart his vast knowledge of the “The Nice Guys” writer/director’s oeuvre. Before we dive into his career and our review of his latest film, which came out last week and sadly underperformed at the box office, we start with a reminder to that the release of Yorgos Lanthimos‘ latest film “The Lobster,” which we discussed on last week’s episode, is expanding to more cities this weekend (I also interviewed Lanthimos on a recent Playlist Podcast episode).
“The Nice Guys,” starring a near-perfect Ryan Gosling and Russell Crowe in a ’70s-set noir mystery, carries the recognizable DNA from all of Black’s scripts and directorial efforts like “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang” and the “Lethal Weapon” series. A mix of light, broad humor and a violent dark streak with bleak undertones, it’s a comedic homage/successor to classics “Chinatown” and “L.A. Confidential,” but with Black’s typical buddy cop/detective elements. Continuing with the show’s main subject, in the final segment we discuss “Lethal Weapon 2” in our latest edition of HOLD UP, where we look back at a film one of us likes but we’re not sure how it might seem these days.
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