The Trajectory of Ryan Gosling's Career
Following the underwhelming debut of The Fall Guy, I wanted to delve into Gosling's career trajectory and explore his future prospects
On September 29, 2000, audiences caught their first glimpse of Ryan Gosling in a brief yet memorable cameo in Denzel Washington’s Remember The Titans. A year later, he starred alongside Sandra Bullock in Murder By Numbers, but his true breakthrough came in 2004 with a leading role in Nick Cassavetes’s The Notebook. Initially met with mixed reviews from critics, the film quickly captured audience fascination with its compelling depiction of young love, enjoying a long-lasting run at the box office.
While Gosling gained popularity after The Notebook, the subsequent years were relatively quiet until his role in the underrated Fracture, where he portrayed a prosecutor facing off against Anthony Hopkins' character in a seemingly straightforward case. Although well-received, it did little to significantly advance his career. Gosling's next notable appearance occurred in 2010 in the arthouse film Blue Valentine, earning praise for his performance in another romantic and emotionally-driven role.
From 2011 to 2016, Gosling's career entered a phase characterized by mid-budget films, often featuring him alongside seasoned and veteran stars. During this period, some films achieved success both critically and at the box office, while others did not fare as well. The three way punch of Crazy, Stupid, Love., Drive, and The Ides of March in 2011 marked a huge year for Gosling that elevated his career significantly, turning him into a leading man. It is just unfortunate that his next box office hit did not come four years later with his role in The Big Short. In between, The Place Beyond The Pines (also massively underrated) fared decently grossing $47.1 million worldwide against a $15 million budget, but Gangster Squad missed the mark, while his second collaboration with director Nicolas Winding Refn on Only God Forgives failed to recapture the magic of Drive. Gosling also ventured into directing, screenwriting, and producing with Lost River, but it is safe to say that his talents are best suited to acting.
In terms of acclaim, Gosling went 2 for 2 in 2016, as both The Nice Guys and La La Land were true crowd-pleasers that garnered positive reviews. However, only La La Land succeeded financially. Similar to The Fall Guy, The Nice Guys stands out as an unfortunate box office flop—a film that moviegoers always claim they want, but never show up for.
But from 2017 to the present, Gosling has emerged as a big-budget movie actor with an alternative approach. This shift began notably with Blade Runner 2049. Prior to this, Gangster Squad had been his most expensive production at $60 million; however, 2049 exceeded this record by two and a half times. A cumulative total of $92 million domestically and $267.6 million worldwide is not bad for a slow-moving, 3-hour, sci-fi melodrama, but due to its high budget and pre-existing fanbase, 2049 was marked as another legacy sequel that underperformed.
Fortunately, it garnered positive reviews and became a visually stunning film by Denis Villeneuve, earning a cult following, thus averting any notion of Gosling's career being doomed. He returned to his mid-budget roots by reuniting with director Damien Chazelle in First Man as Neil Armstrong. While this was another well-received film to add to his resume, it failed to make a significant impact at the box office, demonstrating Gosling’s limited appeal in mainstream cinema.
But due to COVID and production delays, Gosling’s next film would not arrive until almost four years later: The Gray Man. However, unlike his previous efforts, this did not receive a theatrical release and premiered exclusively on Netflix. Combining the star power of Gosling, Chris Evans, and Ana de Armas with the Russo Brothers as directors, Netflix had high hopes for this $200 million production, aiming to kickstart their own espionage franchise. The bar for success in streaming films is something that I have yet to crack. Despite Netflix's claim that The Gray Man was successful, no future installments have been green lit, which leads me to my speculations. Anyhow, it currently stands at sixth place among all of Netflix’s productions with 299.5 million hours viewed and 139.3 million views, ranking behind only Red Notice, Don’t Look Up, The Adam Project, Bird Box, and Leave The World Behind. It sounds like an impressive feat, but it is hard to determine the true success, especially when a film like Bird Box has more views despite having a significantly lower budget of $19.8 million.
In 2023, things took an interesting turn as Gosling emerged as the next big thing, or so it seemed. Fueled by great pre-release buzz and effective marketing, Barbie became a global phenomenon. Gosling's portrayal of Ken impressed many, occasionally overshadowing Margot Robbie's role as Barbie. This dynamic echoed Andrew Garfield's return as Spider-Man in No Way Home. But Garfield's resurgence in this role did not catapult him into immediate stardom, as evidenced by his absence from subsequent projects. Similarly, the success of Top Gun: Maverick did not guarantee a massive boost for Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning to surpass the $1 billion mark that many had anticipated.
This was a lesson that I should have considered when evaluating The Fall Guy’s box office potential last week. I am sure Universal fell into the same trap by releasing this picture with a budget between $130-150 million and an aggressive marketing campaign because they believed, "Oh, because Barbenhemier was so huge, then this will be successful." But the reality is that this did not happen. It performed like any other recent star-driven, non-IP production such as Free Guy, The Lost City, and Bullet Train. This would have been fine, but The Fall Guy was too expensive.
In my eyes, the truth is that Gosling simply is not as big of a star as people and Hollywood make him out to be. He works better in lower budget films that give him the chance to show off his acting capabilities in serious roles such as The Place Beyond The Pines and Drive. Yes, there was Barbie, but that represents an outlier. Prior to Barbie, his last successful release financially was La La Land back in 2016 so he was long overdue for a hit.
Some individuals, regardless of their efforts, may not ascend to the status of blockbuster stars like Tom Cruise, Will Smith, Chris Pratt, Ryan Reynolds, and others, and Gosling serves as an example of this reality. In terms of The Fall Guy, he did his part in drawing a crowd as Deadline noted, “He’s 50% of the reason why people went to see the movie,” but his fanbase alone just cannot account for justifying a such costly production.
I enjoy watching Gosling on screen, do not get me wrong. He brings a lot of charisma and talent to his roles, whether they involve comedy or seriousness. It is not that I am against Gosling, but seeing him in all these big-budget films feels somewhat out of place, as I miss his roles from the early 2010s. However, given the vast changes to the current theatrical landscape, a film like The Ides of March could easily get dumped onto a streaming platform in 2024, as big-budget and IP-driven films are what draw audiences to the cinemas now. So naturally, it makes sense for Gosling to make this transition, even if these bigger scale roles do not suite him as well.
Looking ahead, Gosling is slated to lead Phil Lord and Chris Miller’s Project Hail Mary, set for release on March 20, 2026. Additionally, there is talk of a potential Ocean’s prequel starring him and Margot Robbie, although no production details have been released yet. Whatever the future holds, I wish Gosling the best and hope that success finds him. Like nearly every other star, his career has seen both highs and lows, but I am confident in my assertion that the highs outweigh the lows.