When it comes to filmmakers, few are quite as prolific as one Joe Swanberg. And even fewer are quite as polarizing. Entitled Happy Christmas , the film is a decidedly more nuanced and mature effort from the filmmaker, a return to form for an ever experimenting auteur. Over the last handful of projects, Swanberg has gone down a path of growth as both a writer and a filmmaker, with each new film appearing to be his greatest and most adult work.
Save for the pulpy DePalma-inspired thriller 24 Exposures , films like Drinking Buddies and its fellow release, the underseen gem All The Light In The Sky , Swanberg has proven himself to be an interesting voice with more insight on the human condition than anyone truly seems interested in giving him credit for. Teaming up once again with photographer Ben Richardson, the film looks unlike anything Swanberg has ever made.
Ostensibly just a familial comedy, it lacks that dense meditating of a film like Sky or romantic intrigue like Buddies , but this is a rather punchy and insightful look at marriage and family.
Driven almost entirely by these performances, the film is lucky as all are uniformly great. Swanberg stars here as Jeff, with Melanie Lynskey opposite him as his wife Kelly. The pair on their own are truly fantastic, but the chemistry together pops right off the screen. There are quiet beats here that tell more than any exposition could, ranging from Jeff sitting on his phone while giving his son a bath or a look that Kelly shoots his way while making a request of him.
There is a moment near the end of the film, the couple in front of a Christmas tree, that is as heartfelt and real as anything the director has ever written and it has a level of maturity to it that this type of independent film rarely carries. Rounded out by the pair of Mark Webber and Lena Dunham, the cast here is across the board great, making for a truly rousing and original comedy.
