The Merry Gentleman (2008)

As the movie opens we see a brief scene of a man and woman in the bedroom, and it is clear that he has some anger issues, and at least this time, probably not the first, he has hit her. Then we see her packing some things and leaving. He will eventually track her down, after a long time, and this plays into the overall thrust of the story.Kelly Macdonald is the young woman, Kate Frazier. She starts a new life, a new job, and a new small apartment. Seems everyone asks about where she got the black eye, and each explanation is different.It is nearing Christmastime, and as she exits work one evening looks up at the snow and sees a man standing on the edge of the top of the building across the street. Frightened for him she yells, and he jumps to safety on the roof. She doesn't think too much of it until the police come to talk to her, someone in her building had been shot about that time (we actually see the hit, he called the man's phone to get him at the right place for a clean shot) and they suspected it might have been the same man she saw (it was).Michael Keaton is Frank Logan, who works as a tailor in an upscale shop, but his main occupation is contract hit man. He had seen Kate that night through his rifle scope, perhaps was touched that she called to him, and unknown to her he looked her up. They actually met when she had fallen at the entrance to her building and was trapped under her too-big Christmas tree. He helped her and soon they became good friends. His skill serves well when Kate's abusive husband finally tracks her down.This isn't a very savory topic, but overall Keaton and Macdonald make this a drama a cut above most. The police suspect, and tell her, but she never finds out for sure who he is, and then he disappears.

The Merry Gentleman is one of the most patient and subtle American films I've seen in some time. It involves two characters who will meet, who both have secrets, and who are both alone. We know their secrets. We know their predicaments. This film is not about plot, suspense, mystery, but about two people and their relationship.Frank Logan is a hit man. No film that I can instantly recall has told such a subtle and human story about man of that occupation and it has been covered extensively. We have our hit man comedies, we have our hit man dramas, we have our hit man action, we have our hit man at a crossroads stories, we have our idiot hit men, we have our desperate hit man stories. The list is so substantial that making a film about a hired hand is almost one of the least original stories that could exist. Merry Gentleman seems to have contradicted that claim though, but it does so by not making it the centerpiece of the film. We see Frank Logan kill. We know Frank Logan kills others during the film. However, he could just as easily not be a hit man. In this film his being a hired killer is only a device to meet the character Kate. That we don't look at him as a hired killer, don't think of him like that, is the genius of him happening to be one.Kate Frazier starts the film leaving her husband. She was beaten. Again, this is a familiar situation in films. We have our full gamut of battered wives films. Kate's story, like Frank's, is not about being a battered wife. Again, it's just a reason for her to leave, to find a new job, a job that when leaving she'll see Frank, standing on the ledge of the building across the street. She yells and startles him to stop him from jumping. He falls backwards. Of course, Frank was on that roof to shoot a man that worked in the same building as Kate. Frank and Kate actually meet when he helps her bring her Christmas tree into her apartment building – a scene that may have been a little forced. Again, Frank is there attending to business and again he encounters Kate. From this point on a friendship is formed.That the film keeps their relationship a friendship is admirable. They both just need a friend. Their lives are complicated enough, although that doesn't stop most films from adding a romantic line when it makes no sense. Kate, naturally doesn't know that Frank was the one on that building, what he was doing there, and why he was really showing up at her apartment. And Frank knows nothing of Kate's reasons for her sudden relocation. Why are so they good for each other if they don't really know each other? The film leaves that open to interpretation. Where does the film go? Well, that can't be explained but it comes to a head when Kate's husband shows up.What is so enjoyable about the film is having way more knowledge than the two characters. We know the secrets of both sides and Keaton lets the film play out so patiently that the film is enthralling. It has its humor, it has a bit of twists, but the film is all about the nuanced friendship that grows between two people and where that inevitably has to lead. We know where this film has to go – the characters have to figure out what we know. Don't they? And when they do what will happen? These are the questions that Keaton allows a very moody atmosphere to hide in the back of our heads while he tells and portrays half of the Frank and Kate friendship.It's always interesting when a long-time actor directs their first picture. For Michael Keaton, who went from decent 80s comedies, to being Tim Burton's go-to guy for a stretch, to a string of mid-90s romantic dramas and comedies, and spending the last ten years appearing sporadically primarily in kids movies, it was hard to know what to expect. It's safe to say that Keaton was never in a film reminiscent of The Merry Gentleman. For an actor that does have a good amount of range but has always been a little spastic and energetic, his performance was impressively understated and well played. His acting mimics the patience and mood of his filming, everything is allowed to happen in its own time.The film makes a point of showing Kate as looking like an angel when Frank looks down at her from the rooftop. Frank regards her as a gift when he finds her trapped under her own Christmas tree. Kate makes a comment halfway through the film that their isn't much difference between a ghost and an angel, one guides you and one haunts you but they both need something. It isn't clear if Frank and Kate are angels and ghosts to each other, but certainly they came into each other lives as we expect angels and ghosts do. We fear they'll have to leave each other just as a ghost and angel would as well. In the film, we'll question whether these characters are real at all, and what does it means if they're not. The ending of this film is as bittersweet as a story about ghost and angels would be. This is a film of sacrifice and of two people being gifts for one another and also of having to be ghosts and angels for each other too.B+ (67.5) @ A Reel Perspective

The Merry Gentlemen has the makings, and perhaps even the trappings, of a predictable neo-noir involving a hit-man (Michael Keaton), a detective (Bastounes) and the woman that they're both eying (Kelly MacDonald), and the elements of crime floating all about. But Keaton brings to the table as a first-time director an absolutely unbreakable grasp of what makes the scene(s) work from an actor's stand-point. Ironically for an actor who usually makes his mark in movies as someone with a lot of nervous energy or something that makes him quirky or mysterious (i.e. Batman/Bruce Wayne, Beetlejuice, Jackie Brown), here he's subdued, almost like Alain Deleon in Melville's movies. He doesn't say much, but when he does you listen, especially as his character Logan has pneumonia or carries a Christmas tree.On his own end Keaton's got his character covered wonderfully. That leaves the other two, and one other actor that should be noted. MacDonald is quickly becoming an example of a perfect character actress. It's hard for me to see her becoming a full-blown A-list star, even a decade or more after she hit the scene in her debut in Trainspotting, but when she comes into a role, usually in the supporting variety (most recently No Country for Old Men and Choke) you feel her presence incredibly. She's so vulnerable and adorable, so keen on how her character should be in every moment, as someone who's fragile, been messed with by her husband, but wants to have her space while at the same time being friendly to both the lonely hit-man and the desperate cop. It's hard for me to see a flaw in her performance, and maybe helps elevate things another notch or two. Ditto for Bastounes, one of those actors you swear you've seen somewhere else but actually has only been in one (or none) features before this. He, too, makes a mark playing off both MacDonald like at the restaurant or Keaton in a pivotal scene at the tailor.There's another actor I should also credit, though at the moment I forget his name: he plays MacDonald's character's husband, and he appears out of the darkness in a scene, a recovering abuser with a newfound Jesus addiction who tries to win back his wife's heart as she holds a knife to him. It's one of the best, creepiest dramatic scenes I've yet seen this year. And while I praise his and the other principles performances, the rest of the film around them is... well, good, watchable, though nothing wholly remarkable. At times Keaton is still finding his footing with style, keeping some shots engaging and others just doing a big pan or reveal where it wouldn't be necessary. It's competent work, though, and I would hope to see something else from him; at the least he reveals himself such a fantastic director of his fellow actors (not least of which himself, though as Eastwood shows that's easier done than said) that he may have found a new calling. It's an A-grade acting job amid a decent little B-movie. 7.5/10

Michael Keatons directorial debut is incredible. A beautifully paced film about relationships lonely people and a world of difference between occupations and normal perceptions of society. A subtle bringing together of lost souls. It reminded of Eastwoods style--little dialogue, gestures and expressions sighs and looks counting for the shift of emotions. A dark haunting film magnificently photographed,with shadow darkness and light comprising a stunning view. Miss Mcdonald who I remember from an HBO film with Bill Nighy is simply superb in the role of a receptionist. with one fellow worker friend and a secret reason for her independence. If you want to see a real haunting film about the meaning of life and the world of humanity, I beg you to see this film. I see performances of Oscars and the best film I've seen this year so far.