aban1980 As other reviews have pointed out, this is a movie which should be seen and experienced, instead of reading reviews and narratives about it. This is one of the most enchanting and underrated movie that I have ever seen. It simply transcends movie-making to another level. It is evident that Keaton is a sensitive director, and daring in the sense that he does not try to hide this fact.The characters of the movie have depth. Breathtaking cinematography coupled with an amazing soundtrack makes this movie enjoyable. Where this movie stands out from the usual fare is that it does not try to build up a story or a narrative, instead the characters go with the flow with no attempt to explain any quirks along the way. Which is how life actually is!Kudos to Keaton for bringing out such a wonderful film. I wish I could treat myself to this movie for the first time again.

rddj05 I applaud Keaton for taking his shot behind the camera. However, when I watched the film, I did not know he had directed it. But sometimes, as an audience member, you simply get the feeling about 10-15 minutes in, that you may not in very reliable, or skilled hands. That was the case with The Merry Gentleman.The problems mainly lay with the script. There are FAR too many improbabilities and convenient coincidences in the story to make it believable, and these start to become more and more noticeable as the film goes on. By the time I got half-way through the film, I still didn't have much of an idea of what the central motive of either character was, especially Michael Keaton, and after awhile, I began to stop caring. Michael Keaton plays a professional hit-man, though we never know for who, or why, or even anything about his targets. All we know is that he appears to be terribly sad about it. He is suicidal (the way his first attempt is foiled is practically out of a Buster Keaton comedy), but I would think that a character who was a professional hit-man would come up with far simpler and effective methods to off himself than the ones he attempts in the movie. A gun, maybe? Also, if he's so tortured about what he does, wouldn't make sense for him to kill himself BEFORE you completes another job?? We never really find out much about this character as he slowly moves through the film mumbling a word here or a word there. Even in a scene in a hospital scene that appears to be inserted into the film to try and give the audience some idea of who this character is, we still get nothing...and that nothing takes a whole lot of time to get to. There is a strange plot twist in the 2nd half of the film, where writer tries to tie up the loose end of the abusive husband. All I can say is that it involves yet another convenient coincidence involving a business card to a local hotel.Kelly McDonald, a fine actress, is really the lead of the film, but even here the writer didn't give her character much logic to work with. The film opens with her leaving her abusive husband after he gives her a nasty shiner. Somehow, within a few days, she is suddenly in a new city, with a new job. Just like that. How this all happened, again is a mystery. Even though the black eye is something she'd rather hide and not talk about, she bizarrely shows up at an office Christmas party where she certainly must know that she'll be asked about it repeatedly (which, of course, she is) . Obviously not wanting to jump into any new relationships due to her abusive past, she rejects the advances of a few of her new co- workers, but then inexplicably falls for Michael Keaton's character after one brief run-in, who, in their first meeting, comes off as a bit, well....creepy. For a smart girl, she also seems completely clueless that a police officer investigating a case she's involved in as a witness, is interested in her romantically. The light takes a while to go on apparently.All and all, there's never enough of anyone's life to really dig into, but more a 2-dimensional picture of it all. The look and tone of the film is a bit of a mess. There is a slew of completely unmotivated camera moves and cuts that defy all logic, almost as if Keaton was terrified of having the film look too plain. As a result, it winds up being a mishmash of different styles that belong in a dozen different films. This could also be said of the mind-boggling score and music cues. In the end, it seems like the film really didn't know what it wanted to be; sometimes a gritty drama, sometimes a Billy Wilder comedy, sometimes a teary melodrama, and sometimes a Basic Instinct-type thriller. Though the last 20 minutes of the film do actually do manage to build some tension through proper pacing, the ending is simply befuddling. There's a difference between leaving an ending open because you want to challenge the audience into thinking about what might happen, and leaving an ending open because you simply can't come up with a proper or satisfying one. I can only imagine that this film got made because the writer knew Keaton, Keaton signed on to play the (quite undeveloped) lead role, and the financing followed from there.

Siamois This very simple tale aims for a feel similar to a Coen brothers noir-ish film but the actual craftsmanship and writing is not up to the task. The premise is that of two loners who have nothing in common but nonetheless bound together. One character is a hit-man, played by director Michael Keaton. The other is Kate, a woman fleeing a past of abuse, played by Kelly MacDonald.Unfortunately, there's nothing here to rejuvenate the classic elements such as the nice-guy- hit-man who is poorly socialized. The quirky relationships falls a little flat compared to other movies of the genre. Everybody will root for poor Kate to get her life on track after a bad relationship, I couldn't help but feel it all tied up a little nicely for her.There's just nothing terribly interesting about this plot or the characters to make me care

iwishicouldthink-1 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