'The Nice Guys' is another great, unjustly overlooked 2016 film

Something strange has been happening this year at the movies.

Either the critics and myself are just getting even further out of step with moviegoers, or the studios are doing a poor job marketing their best products.

With the exception of the new Captain America film and 10 Cloverfield Lane, the best movies I've seen so far this year have all been flops or commercial non-factors. The critics got Keanu, Hail Caesar, The Witch and Green Room, but audiences didn't. And the same can be said for Shane Black's raucously fun throwback buddy movie The Nice Guys.

I was sure that this film would be a breakout hit. It had a crackerjack trailer that scored laughs whenever I saw it. Ryan Gosling is at his rakish best here, building off the comic chops he showed off in The Big Short and a truly transformed Russell Crowe delivers perhaps the most likable performance of his career as a rotund tough guy who beats up people for money.

Perhaps it's because, like so few films aimed at adult audiences, The Nice Guys is devoid of CGI, isn't based on some established property, isn't a remake or a reboot. It's just a fresh, funny, old school action film -- with an engaging twisty plot that pays off in surprising ways.

It's not really about anything -- but that's not necessarily a bad thing. Director Shane Black's 2005 film Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang -- which covered similar terrain and makes for a great double header with this one -- didn't have any profound messages either, but it contained Val Kilmer's best work in a decade and one of Robert Downey Jr's best recent turns outside of an Iron Man suit.

I hope he keeps making these types of films, which are peppered with his delightful ear for quirky dialogue and off the wall situations. Shane Black's buddy films (stretching back to Lethal Weapon) feel organic and well-earned, instead of most modern iterations, which feel convoluted and as if contrived in a board room (here's looking at you Central Intelligence).

I fell for The Nice Guys from the very first frame when they used the retro, Saul Bass-designed Warner Bros. logo, which is my favorite of all time. The soundtrack is note perfect, as is the late-70s movie posters and costumes that pepper the background.

But what makes the movie work is its corker of a script and its game performances. Crowe in particular surprised me. He wears the added weight well, and he has more warmth than I'm used to seeing from him. And it's not all a testosterone affair, the Gosling character's daughter -- played by the luminous Angourie Rice -- rises above what could have been a cloying role and delivers what could be a star making performance.

Hopefully, The Nice Guys will have a shelf life over the years because it really deserves an audience. Sadly, we won't get to see the Gosling and Crowe characters continue on together in future films -- they have great chemistry -- I just don't get why ticket buyers weren't interested in what they were selling.