Robert Downey's latest The Nice Guys Cameo, Explained

Shane Black's 2016 neo-noir buddy comedy The Nice Guys has become a cult classic despite being less than a decade old. The film follows troubled private investigator Holland March (Ryan Gosling) and contract enforcer Jackson Healy (Russell Crowe) as they search for missing teen Amelia (Margaret Qualey), whom Healy was supposed to protect. It allowed the two actors to really show off their comedic chops and chemistry, and it has so close to the perfect buddy comedy how can you get It's funny, it's action-packed, and it's a little scary at times in a fun way, like any of the several times March essentially throws himself into a long, painful tumble and somehow manages to survive each time.

While March becomes convinced that he can't die (when in fact he's probably just drunk enough to rag the doll and not injure himself more), things get especially scary when he ends up at the bottom of the hill, next to a bloody one. corpse. March gets upset, as we all probably would, and the horrifying moment becomes funny as he whistles and desperately tries to escape. But audiences who looked closely might notice something unusual about the dearly departed dead guy: He's played by none other than Robert Downey Jr.

The body is missing about half of its face, and since the event takes place at night, it is a bit more difficult to identify him. But eagle-eyed viewers could tell it was Downey, bloodied and hurt in an uncredited episode. He plays the body of porn producer Syd Shattuck, the financier of an experimental porn film that hides an important message about a government conspiracy in its raunchy sex scenes. His wounds are gruesome and disturbing, but a slightly hardened Healy is able to identify him as Shattuck using the contents of his wallet before the two knock him over a fence in an attempt to distance himself from the crime scene. (They also go up a bit in response to the awkwardness of the corpse, but luckily the movie is set in the 1970s and DNA testing won't be around for another few decades.)

Unfortunately, they pick the wrong fence and end up dropping poor old dead Syd on a table in the center of what looks like a wedding or very fancy birthday party, causing a lot of screaming, sending the nice guys running as fast as they possibly can.

Dark, surreal humor is Shane Black's trademarkand it's great that Downey was able to be a part of one of the darkest and funniest scenes in “The Nice Guys,” even if it's just an uncredited, easily overlooked cameo. It might seem that Downey is too big a star to tackle such a non-role role, especially since his turns as Tony Stark in Iron Man and The Avengers already catapulted him to superstar status in 2015, but Downey and Black had a history as friends.

In 2005, Downey starred in Black's directorial debut Kiss Kiss Bang Bang. Black had become known for his work as a screenwriter, producing major action scripts such as Last Action Hero and The Long Kiss Goodnight, as well as the Lethal Weapon film series, but he saw “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang” as his “anti-action movie” and went in a completely different direction. There are still plenty of great buddy comedy romps out there, but Kiss Kiss Bang Bang is a dialogue-heavy neo-noir black comedy that wasn't quite what anyone expected, and unfortunately bombed at the time, only just recovering from its modest production. the budget.

The film has since become a cult classic (much like The Nice Guys) and is quite beloved, and is also responsible for Downey enters the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Iron Man director Jon Favreau thought Downey's performance in the film was perfect and used it to win over executives, leading to Downey bringing in Shane Black as writer and director for Iron Man 3.

Downey may have been busy filming 'Avengers: Age of Ultron' or 'Captain America: Civil War' while filming 'The Nice Guys', but it's great that he still had some time to make a cameo in his film . a friend's movie.