Director Shane Black was the writer of the first two Lethal Weapon movies and he has put together another buddy cop movie which hits all the right notes. Ryan Gosling is Holland March a private investigator who’s wife died when their child was young leaving him to bring up their now thirteen year old daughter Holly (Angourie Rice). He is hired to find a adult movie star Misty Mountains who is supposed to be dead but his client is adamant is still alive and this leads him in the direction of Amelia Kutner (Margaret Qualley) who co-starred with Misty in a recent movie but Amelia has her own man on the case to protect herself, in the form of Jackson Healy (Russell Crowe) who is more enforcer then investigator and while initially warning Holland off the trail, realises there is something more sinister going on, is smart enough to know he needs help and decides to team up with Holland to get to the bottom of things.

March is an alcoholic and not a very good investigator but he has a strange knack of stumbling across clues when needed most and this leads to some of the funniest moments of the movie where Gosling shows off a great talent for comedy and gives us a great rendition of a Wilhelm scream from time to time. Crowe beefed out for the role and the burly look suits him and his dead pan comedy compliments Goslings exuberance brilliantly so it feels like both actors enjoyed the filming of the movie and it comes across great on the screen with some real chemistry showing. This is all enhanced by Rices performance as the real brains of the operation and this triangular relationship that develops is the real heart of the movie and makes us care about these three characters who, despite the title, are not really particularly nice people. Yes they want to get to the bottom of the investigation, but only because they are being paid and if they can take another slice of the pie along the way, well then they won’t hesitate to do so.

As good as Gosling and Crowe are a special mention must be given to Rice, as for such a young actress to be able to hold her own in scenes with two a-list actors is a testament to her talent so it will be very interesting to see her development from here.

The rest of the cast is very much supporting and a bit of a side show, even Kim Basinger as Amelia’s mother, Judith Kutner didn’t really make much of an impression and the one other character who has some good scenes was the assassin John Boy (Matt Bomer) but he only appears in the movie for a short while so it would have been nice to see him utilised a bit more.

It’s a dark comedy that swings between slap stick moments to clever dialogue for the laughs and although some of the time it misses the mark, thanks to the great chemistry, a good script and the setting of 1977 Los Angeles it works very well and gives us one of the better movies of this year so far that I recommend you check out.

DJ Speaks: 7 Out Of 10