The Merry Gentleman
| The Merry Gentleman | |
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Theatrical release poster
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| Directed by | Michael Keaton |
| Produced by | Ron Lazzeretti Steven A. Jones Tom Bastounes |
| Written by | Ron Lazzeretti |
| Starring |
Michael Keaton Kelly Macdonald Mike Bradecich Darlene Hunt Debbi Burns Maritza Cabrera |
| Music by | Jon Sadoff |
| Cinematography | Chris Seager |
| Edited by | Grant Myers |
| Distributed by | Genius Entertainment |
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Release date
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Running time
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96 mins |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Box office | $322,581 |
The Merry Gentleman is a 2008 drama film directed by Michael Keaton (in his directorial debut), and starring Keaton and Kelly Macdonald. It is about a woman who leaves an abusive relationship to start a new life in Chicago, where she forms a friendship with a hitman who is undergoing his own emotional crisis.
The Merry Gentleman is the story of Kate, a young woman who flees her abusive policeman husband, moving to Chicago. In her new life, she befriends a co-worker but otherwise generally keeps to herself, due to her embarrassment over a black eye left over from her husband's latest attack. Most everyone she encounters is of low character, which reinforces her feelings of loneliness and reclusion.
One night, she is seen in an office window through the rifle scope of professional hit man Frank Logan, who is on the roof of the opposite building, as he prepares to shoot the occupant on another floor. Afterwards, rather than leaving, he removes his hat and steps out on to the ledge as he apparently prepares to jump. As Kate steps out onto the sidewalk, she looks up at the falling snow and sees Frank on the ledge. She cries out, startling him into safely falling backward onto the roof.
She decides to bring a small bit of joy to her life by buying a Christmas tree. Later that night, she encounters Frank at her apartment building. She doesn't recognize him as the man on the roof, and he helps her carry the big Christmas tree to her apartment. He later returns to meet with her, but collapses from pneumonia before he can reveal why he's there. Kate rushes him to the hospital, and despite the awkwardness of their conversation there, they develop a friendship that has hints of romance. Some time after his release, she mentions the old hat that he wears and wonders about "the things it has seen," unknowingly referring to the many men that Frank has murdered. Meanwhile, Kate also becomes the romantic interest of Murcheson, the detective investigating Frank's latest murder. Murcheson asks Kate out to dinner, but she mistakes the date for a meeting about the investigation, and cuts the date short when she realizes Murcheson's romantic interest.
Initially, the police remain oblivious to the fact that Frank is a professional killer, due to his framing the murder on another man, who he then killed in a manner to make the police suspect suicide. However, complications arrive when Kate's husband, Det. Michael Elkhart, tracks her down and breaks into her apartment. Michael swears he has become a safe and spiritual man, but the encounter leaves Kate badly shaken. She turns to Murcheson for help, but before he can intervene, Frank fatally shoots Michael in his motel room and makes it look like a suicide. The police begin to suspect that Frank may be behind all three deaths.
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Wikipedia