Manchester by the Sea (2016) | Film Review

Manchester by the Sea alternates between powerfully grieving and raucously funny at the flip of a switch without warning. It captures loss, emotion and unspoken words and feelings in the maelstrom of tragedy with an acuity that never feels overwrought or melodramatic. It is easily one of the best films I have watched this year.

It is winter. A janitor working in Boston named Lee Chandler (Casey Affleck) fixes apartments, takes out the garbage and does his work with silent efficiency. He is a man of few words and speaks bluntly, as a bad-tempered tenant finds to her shock. Afterwards, he spends his night at a bar by himself. An attractive woman tries to make conversation, but he isn’t interested. Later, heavily drunk, he gets into a fight with two other patrons. He returns to his one-roomed home. This is Lee’s life. You get the sense for him, this is routine.

This routine gets disrupted when a call forces him, reluctantly, to return to his hometown, Manchester by the Sea. His older brother Joe (Kyle Chandler) has died from a weak heart. Patrick (Lucas Hedges), his son- and Lee’s nephew- is still a minor and minus a guardian. His mother, an alcoholic, left them years ago. In Joe’s will, he has left enough money and instructions for Lee to take care of Patrick until he turns eighteen, but Lee has no intention of staying in Manchester by the Sea, where a horror from his past still looms around him like a spectre.

Kenneth Lonergan originally wrote Manchester by the Sea for Matt Damon to star in and direct, who envisioned the idea in a conversation with actor John Krasinki. Damon commissioned the script from Lonergan, partly as a means to help out his friend after the tumultuous production, Margaret, Lonergan’s previous film that took nearly five years to release. But after reading the script, Damon insisted that Lonergan direct it instead while he would star in it. In the end, though, Damon would ultimately give the role to Casey Affleck, his best friend’s younger brother, but he still produced the film.

It’s an interesting “what-if” scenario because it is difficult to imagine Manchester by the Sea in any other final form but this: staggering, yet quietly moving; powerfully acted yet subtle and minimal, an epic of human drama. Lonergan captures the small minutiae of everyday life without ever resorting to clichés. So many untold stories crowd at the fringes of all these different people, their lives and pasts. It is a rich, complex, fleshed out and fully-realised world that Lonergan has drawn.

Through the clever use of flashbacks, Lonergan avoids the need for heavy exposition to explain why it’s torturous for Lee to return to the beautiful town. In another life, Lee was a happy man, going out fishing with Joe and young Patrick, who loved his wife, Randi (Michelle Williams), and his three young children. One late night- or early morning- after already having gone through a night of heavy drinking and partying, Lee walks to the store to buy a pack of beer. Before he left, he lit up the fireplace to warm the children’s rooms upstairs because he couldn’t switch on the central heating since it gave Randi headaches. Halfway to the store, he remembers he forgot to put the protective screening in front of the fireplace. But he figure it’s alright and doesn’t turn back. He returns to find his house consumed in flames. The firemen have to restrain a screaming Randi from running back because the children are still inside. And Lee? He stands still and silent, clutching his bag of groceries. The morning after, he’s still holding on to the bag. Randi’s stretcher wheels don’t collapse when being loaded into the ambulance, prolonging the moment and its agony. Firemen carry the corpses of the children in body bags, pitifully tiny in the arms of adults. And Lee still clings to the bag of groceries. At the police station, nobody holds Lee responsible for the fire. Lee silently walks out of the interrogation room and grabs a holstered pistol from a passing officer. He points the gun at his head and presses the trigger. The safety is on. He tries to kill himself because he can’t live with the knowledge of his slip-up but failing in his attempt, he endures it. Silent, stoically, Lee suffers in his misery.

These, and more, are the small moments that make up a poignant whole. It is not a “dark” film. Instead, Lonergan balances it with the light, for life is a mix of both. In a scene after they return from the funeral house and argue about Joe’s body being kept at the morgue until spring, Patrick opens the freezer. Packets of frozen chicken spill out. He bends to pick them up, and starts to panic and cry. Lee doesn’t know how to react. There’s yelling and confusion, all culminating in an exchange that cuts deep while also winding up as exceedingly hilarious:

LEE: … if you’re gonna freak out every time you see a frozen chicken, I think maybe we should take you the hospital. I don’t know anything about this.
PATRICK: I just don’t like him being in the freezer!

Casey Affleck and Lucas Hedges, who share the bulk of screen time, are astounding and phenomenal in their performances. Affleck allows his verbal language to communicate the grief he carries inside him, while Patrick tries to carry on with his life with school, band practices and his two girlfriends. After all, in real life, do we completely collapse for weeks on end in the aftermath of a beloved one’s death, or do we continue with our daily lives as best as we can?

Michelle Williams, despite her few scenes, is a scene-stealer, particularly in her final heart-aching conversation with Lee. Even Kyle Chandler, who appears briefly in the flashbacks, makes a powerful impact and his absence is genuinely felt in Lee’s and Patrick’s lives.

Manchester by the Sea is many things. It is well-written, superbly acted and directed with quiet confidence. It is thoughtful and honest, amusing and aching, nuanced and complex, and the film is better for it.

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WRITTEN AND DIRECTED BY: Kenneth Lonergan
PRODUCED BY: Matt Damon, Kimberly Steward, Chris Moore, Kevin J. Walsh, Lauren Beck

STARRING: Casey Affleck, Michelle Williams, Kyle Chandler, Lucas Hedge, Matthew Broderick