Welcome to "Ranked", a weekly series where I rank a franchise or filmography from worst to best and hand out assorted related superlatives. This week, I'm profiling the work of David Leitch-whose latest project "How to Rob a Bank" releases in theaters on Thursday.
David Leitch's Filmography Ranked:
6.Bullet Train (B+)
5.Hobbs & Shaw (B+)
4.Deadpool 2 (B+)
3.Atomic Blonde (B+)
2.John Wick (A-)
1.The Fall Guy (A)
Top Dog: The Fall Guy (2024)
Leitch's ode to the stunt community he came up in is the kind of infectious blockbuster fun that makes movies such a magical transporative artform. Ryan Gosling uses every ounce of his charisma and elite comedic instincts to play a veteran stuntman who gets in some hot water with the law upon his return to work after a near fatal on set accident took him away from the gig for multiple years, Emily Blunt is equally great as his former love interest-turned boss on his big comeback movie and the wide array of practical stunt work that Leitch cooks up from car flips to fist fights to flaming boat jumps are all outstanding.
Bottom Feeder: Bullet Train (2022)
It honestly feels kind of mean to categorize Bullet Train as "bad" as it's something I wouldn't do in any other context. However, something has to occupy the bottom slot in Leitch's strong filmography, and this just happened to be that unlucky duck. The reason that it landed here is simply due to Leitch not being quite as good at making Guy Ritchie-esque crime comedies as he is more action-heavy fare.
Most Underrated: Hobbs & Shaw (2019)
There was part of me that wanted to pick Deadpool 2 since it's widely considered to be the worst entry in the franchise and I believe that the opposite is true (Leitch having way more sauce than Tim Miller or Shawn Levy and Josh Brolin's Cable being the only compelling villain in the entire series are the main reason why), but even at its perceived lowest, the Deadpool franchise is still considerably more well-liked than any of the post-Furious 7 entries in the Fast franchise. Hobbs & Shaw materialized from the endearingly combative rapport that Jason Statham and Dwayne Johnson displayed when they were paired together in The Fate of the Furious and building an entire movie around them proved to be a great idea. Leitch put together some of the best action sequences of the entire franchise that blended his hand-to-hand combat prowess with the manic over-the-top setpieces that the main franchise has become known for in recent years, all of the series newcomers (Vanessa Kirby, Idris Elba, Eddie Marsan) display a perfect understanding of the self-aware ridiculousness that makes these movies tick and best of all, Statham and Johnson continue to have a blast exchanging insults while they reluctantly work together to save the world from a dire threat.
Most Overrated: None
I apologize for potentially giving anyone reading this shock-induced cardiac distress by declaring that a director that has never made a movie that I've rated lower than a B+ has no overrated movies. Leitch is one of the steadiest hands in blockbuster filmmaking today and I'll be very disheartened if the day comes where I walk out of one of his movies without a giddy grin on my face.
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