September's #HunkOfTheMonth, Ryan Reynolds

For September's #HunkOfTheMonth column, Liam Livings brings us the delicious Ryan Reynolds.

When I decide whether I’m going to watch a film I have a few tests, and in order of importance they are:

1. Who plays the main characters in it? I will be very forgiving for films containing actors I like. Once I like an actor I’m happy to range long and wide across genres to spend time with him/her, because I enjoy seeing them play whomever.

2. What’s it about? There needs to be a story, you know, where stuff happens, preferably to people in a contemporary setting, involving romance and a complete absence of any zombies, apocalypse, aliens, space craft or long sequences featuring car chases and guns. Anything described as ‘beautifully filmed’ or ‘wonderfully atmospheric’ is a no for me because, from experience, it’s usually like sitting in an art gallery for two hours where the visuals are wonderful but nothing happens.

3. How long is the film? My sweet spot for films is ninety minutes. I’ll tolerate two hours, but anything more than that needs to have four of my go-to actors and an amazing story line, otherwise I’m just not interested.

As you can see I rule my film-watching with a rod of iron. I first discovered Ryan Reynolds in the wicked-funny and movingly-sad, power-role-reversal RomCom, The Proposal. It’s one of my RomComs featured in my last post. I came to The Proposal because I love Sandra Bullock, it’s ninety minutes long, and it’s about a man and a woman who are thrown together and fall in love. So it ticks all three of my boxes above.

But I re-watched The Proposal loads of times for the humourous Ryan (I’m just gonna dive right in and use his first name like we’re friends), and also the numerous times he is walking around in his underwear. Of course the morning in bed scene is pretty hilarious too.

I loved Ryan in The Change Up as a perpetually single man enjoying the life of a bachelor, while his best friend is married with children. The whole life-swap trope has been done loads of times, and it is a rich seam to mine in terms of contrast and humour.

Freaky Friday—the original with Jodie Foster as a teenager—is my fave, but we’ll save that for another post. Breaking with my usual rule of not watching any films about superheroes, since it fails question two above and is not my thing—except Spiderman with Toby Maguire, but that’s not for now—I watched Deadpool simply because Ryan Reynolds is the main character. Again, it’s very funny. It’s also pretty tongue-in-cheek, has self-referential humour, and poking fun at superheroes etc, which I loved. Plus, you get to see Ryan in a very tight superhero suit that shows all his muscles and impressive body...

I used to get Ryan Reynolds and Ryan Gosling mixed up, now I don’t, but instead I simply comfort myself with the thought of Ryan Reynolds and Ryan Gosling together. If that floats your boat, just take a few moments to picture that in your mind’s eye. If it’s not for you, then of course, swipe left to the whole concept and continue with my article.

Reasons Ryan is my hunk of the month, in no particular order:

1. He’s ageing very nicely and looks just as sexy as a silver fox as he did more than ten years ago with brown hair.

2. Unlike most men, he suits a beard, clean shaven and stubble. He has the sort of face to carry it off effortlessly and so well.

3. I love how his roles aren’t all the same. He’s played good guys, geeks, slackers, superheros, bad guys, etc. It’s a testament to how great an actor he is that when I see him in a film, I forget any of the other roles he’s done and only see him in the role he’s portraying.

4. He can act. Unlike some other pretty-boy-turned-silver-fox actors who undeniably look pretty in front of the camera, but subscribe to the Joey-Tribiani-from-Friends, ‘smell-the-fart’ school of acting, Ryan acts his arse off in all his roles, disappearing to become the character.

5. His body—which he has no problem at all displaying on screen—is smokin’ hot. And over the years he’s gotten bigger and better—in my view anyway. He’s often on the cover of Men’s Health magazine talking about how to build muscles. And if looking that amazing in only a black T-shirt is wrong, then I don’t wanna be right.

6) He looks just as cute in a grey suit (my idea of hell), a T-shirt over a long sleeved shirt, a hoodie, a plain dark T-shirt, or indeed a tight, rubber, superhero suit. Gotta love that versatility!

Liam Living's latest release, Heat Wave Astoria, is out now. For more information check out his website and follow him on Facebook and Twitter.