One more who had a good year

Each year in my year-end wrap-up post, when I honor "three who had a good year" and dishonor "three who had a bad year," it always feels a bit limiting that I'm forced to discuss primarily actors and actresses. That's because I'm trying to establish a trend of greatness or lack thereof, not just honor a single work that is either a feather in someone's cap or an embarrassment. Typically, significant creative types other than actors and actresses don't have more than a single work in a year, and I'm not digging deep here to let you know which key grip gripped it the best. Or, I suppose, the worst.

So I was a bit disappointed to realize Sunday night that I missed an obvious candidate for 2019, who would have broken me out of my restriction to only those appearing in front of the camera. He did appear in front of the camera, but he also appeared behind, and both were films I really loved.

I am speaking of comedian Stephen Merchant, who made his solo directorial debut in 2019 with Fighting With My Family, my #28 film of the year. (He directed a film I've never heard of in 2010 called Cemetery Junction, but that was co-directed with long-time collaborator Ricky Gervais.) He also appeared in front of the camera in a small but crucial role in Jojo Rabbit, which rounded out my top ten. For good measure, I only just noticed he was also in a small role in Good Boys (#45), which I wouldn't have been able to produce from memory but which I think I can now remember as a selling point for that film as well. Since I'm a little foggier on that one, this will be its only mention.

That's three 2019 feathers in one cap, so I thought it was finally time to give Stephen Merchant his due.

I watched Fighting With My Family again on Sunday night, as this year's second entry in an informal series I think of as "Showing My Wife a Film I Loved from the Previous Year." The first was Midsommar on New Year's Eve. Both have been comparative deep cuts, as both films landed in my 20s from last year. I'm sure the really heavy hitters will be on their way. (Both films also feature Florence Pugh, but that has to be a coincidence ... right? Winky emoticon.)

It took this second viewing for me to notice Merchant's sterling year. He's in this movie, as well, playing the father of the girlfriend of the main character's brother (whew) in two scenes. When I first saw the movie, I thought Merchant's scenes, the longer of which is near the start, were too broad by half, making me worried about the prospects of the film on the whole. I didn't find that to be the case this time, which I suppose could just be because I now know how much I like the movie. But maybe I was predisposed to be too hard on Merchant, and I'll tell you why that might be.

I've been really wearied by Stephen Merchant for a number of years now. Coming on the scene as the creative partner of Gervais, he was of course in my good graces straight away. But his on-screen persona became a tiresome shtick more quickly than I thought it might, to the point that seeing Merchant appear in a film or TV show was a sure sign for my brain to prepare my eyes to roll. Such lowlights included Movie 43, I Give it a Year and Table 19. I truly thought Merchant had shown us everything he had to offer, and it was just more downhill from here. (And my new perspective on him was such that I ignored his work in films I liked, like Hall Pass and Logan.)

Then at the start of 2019 he started to win me back into his good graces by surprising me. Not only did I find it unlikely for Merchant to direct a feature film, I found it particularly unlikely for him to direct a feature film about professional wrestling. It would be like Wes Craven directing a film about people who play the violin. (Wait, that actually happened.)

The surprises continued -- he was great at it. Watching it a second time on Sunday reminded me not only how he gets just the right performances from all -- literally, all -- of his actors, but how he's clever with the camera too. I marveled at one shot where the camera has to cross a ring of wrestlers and into an office set in one unbroken take, and how the set would have had to be constructed just so to allow that to happen. Then I noticed a great use of rack focus late in the movie. In one shot, it crystallized the main character's resolve not to quit -- without any words, just changes of focus on the three different planes of the mis en scene. There isn't a wasted shot in this film, nor one set up incorrectly. You could credit the DP with that, but the director tells the DP how he or she sees it all playing out.

The surprises continued to continue late in the year with Jojo Rabbit. Not only was his role as an officer in the Nazi secret police not his usual shtick, it was pretty much the exact opposite. There's some use of his gifts (albeit slightly withered lately) for comic timing in the performance, but this is not a comedic role in the slightest. He exudes a menace I never thought was possible from the man, as his eyes shoot daggers even as his face grins. He's solely responsible for the enormous amount of tension that builds in his scene. There's a weird physicality to Merchant's gangliness, but I've never before seen it purposed to its best possible usage in terms of discomfiting us. He reminded me a bit of one of those creepy tall men in Dark City.

At this point, I can't decide what I'm looking forward to more, Merchant's next trip behind the camera or his next trip in front of it.

That's a year worth honoring indeed.