Sometimes the movies that Joe Swanberg makes get flack, because they’re small in scope, made using loose outlines and actor improvisation rather than full scripts, and he’s generally able to churn a ton of them out in a small amount of time. Some pundits even go as far as to say that they’re not real movies, just video projects or something, like someone might do in art school. That kind of closed-minded thinking discounts the authenticity and the moments of serendipitous magic that can come from getting the right chemical mix of talented improvisors in a room and letting them just live in the moment though. Movies like this, they can tap into truths that reflect our real lives so much more accurately than scripted drama can, and as Swanberg’s career has progressed and he’s gotten the opportunity to work with more and more experienced actors, his stuff has just gotten better and better. His 2013 movie Drinking Buddies was not only the most commercial thing he’s done, it was probably also the best thing he’s done, and this new project, Happy Christmas, tops even that.
The story here is simple and the focus in on character, as always. Jenny (Anna Kendrick) is in her late twenties, but is still as directionless as people usually are when they’re in their early twenties. We don’t really know why that is, but we get a good indication that something has recently gone wrong in her life, and we know that she’s just ended a relationship (a move everyone questions) and has decided to move to Chicago in order to live with her brother (Swanberg) and to help him and his wife (Melanie Lynskey) take care of their baby. The problem with that plan is, after a night out with her best friend (Lena Dunham) that ends up in a drunken blackout, and after an awkward romantic encounter with the couple’s babysitter (Mark Webber) that triggers a personal crisis, it becomes unclear whether or not Jenny can really be trusted to take care of much of anything. Of course, while all of this nuts and bolts plot stuff plays out, relationships get formed, interactions both tense and joyful are had, and personal growth is achieved—and thus we have a movie.
The main reason that Happy Christmas is the best thing that Swanberg has made yet is that the cast he’s working with—particularly Kendrick and Lynskey—are just so dang good together. Kendrick has kind of made her mark playing characters who are the sweet, girl next door types, so it’s interesting to see her play someone who’s kind of a mess—to the point of being a little bit unlikable—here. The effect is even heightened because she shares a lot of scenes with Dunham, who has made her name playing lost and selfish young people, but who is playing a supportive best friend-type here. It’s interesting to watch the two swap their usual personas while proving that they can both be equally effective while looking at things from the opposite end of the table. Plus, Kendrick is so good at projecting a suppressed pain and darkness that we’re never able to count out her character or stop rooting for her, even when she’s behaving badly, and that goes a long way toward keeping her personal little dramas engaging.
At this point in her career, everyone was already expecting Kendrick to be good though. What might take people a little bit more by surprise is how good Lynskey is. She’s been around for a while, but mostly in supporting roles, so not everyone has picked up on how solid her work always is. What she gets to do here as the Swanberg character’s wife comes as a bit of a surprise. At first it seems like she’s going to be stuck in another supporting role, doing that thing where she plays the nagging wife that gets on everyone’s nerves, but after a bonding scene or two between her and Kendrick’s character, things go in a completely different and welcome direction. In the end, Lynskey’s character is the one who goes through the biggest transformation over the course of the film, so she’s kind of the secret protagonist, and it gives her the chance to prove that she has what it takes to steal a movie.
Unfortunately for her though, she isn’t quite able to steal the movie, because Swanberg’s son, Jude, plays the baby, and he is absolutely the most charismatic, insane baby I’ve ever seen. His performance might be the best by a baby actor in movie history. He’s the baby Meryl Streep, if the baby Meryl Streep was starring in a Tracy Morgan biopic.
The other reason Happy Christmas works so well, aside from the acting, is the way that its drama is handled and the way that it deliberately builds to a proper climax. The big moment of action sneaks up on you so quietly that it comes as something of a surprise, but after it happens you realize that every scene that came before it was setting it up perfectly. In the end, it turns out that the protagonist we’ve been relating to is really pretty broken, but we’re only given the faintest hints of her dilemma throughout, so when we realize the extent of the pain we’ve been sitting in the middle of all along, it’s a real revelation.
The reason you don’t quite realize that this movie isn’t just a series of scenes of people hanging out, like many criticize Swanberg’s work as truly being, is that the drama is always happening in the background, so you have to read between the lines to find it. In the foreground of any given scene will be something innocuous, like a crazy baby that’s going about his weirdo business, or a dog that people are playing with, and in the background will be a character who just briefly lets a stray thought or a glimmer of a feeling play across their face. That’s how people deal with pain in real life, by pushing it to the back of their mind and going about their daily routines, not by wallowing in it so that a camera can get a closeup on their face and every last bit of their emoting can later be read on a screen. Real life might not be very cinematic, but it sure hits hard when it wants to.
