Manchester By the Sea is very obvious Oscar bait. Good, but broken, leading man? Check. Traumatic event? Check. Unlikely friendship with a kid? Checkmate. However, Kenneth Lonergan and Casey Affleck elevate Manchester By the Sea out of its Award Season trappings to tell a very somber story about a man struggling to cope with loss. Afflecks doing Boston accents strike again!
Lee Chandler (Casey Affleck) is living a crappy existence as an electrician in Boston. This choice is deliberate; Lee wants to forget his past life with wife Randi (Michelle Williams) and 3 kids. However, Lee’s brother Joe (Kyle Chandler) passes away, forcing Lee to return home to Manchester, Massachusetts. Joe surprise Lee as well by declaring him the legal guardian of Joe’s son Patrick (Lucas Hedges). This forces Lee to try to raise Patrick while confronting and living in his past, no easy feat for the broken man.
Kenneth Lonergan, the creative force behind Manchester By the Sea, goes great lengths to make sure the audience 1) connects with the story and 2) doesn’t get overly bummed out. With material here this dark, Lonergan writes in some very funny material especially involving Patrick or Lee’s interactions with other people. Lee’s brokenness is mined for some very funny interactions especially with women who find him cute; he is so not interested that he has no idea how to talk to these women, leading to some awkward attempts at flirtation. Conversely, Patrick’s loss is painful, but Joe was sick for a while, so Patrick uses his “sadness” in his favor. He tries to balance multiple girlfriends, manipulates their parents into private time with them, and uses Lee’s lack of parenting to get the most out of his situation. Flashbacks also give us glimpses of what this family was like during better times, night time drinking sessions and all. These light moments give the audience ample sympathy for these 2 guys when traumatic things start to happen. Also, Lonergan’s script shows how these traumas affect the two in different ways. Lee is so disillusioned that he just goes about his day without reacting in any way except when alone. Patrick’s grief comes out at weird times due to the nature of his family and the people of Manchester keeping their feelings to a minimum. Differentiating the characters and how grief affects them shows Lonergan has a deft hand telling this story, using the pieces around each character and specific griefs to give fun texture around a really sad story.
This will be the best performance Casey Affleck will have as an actor. The guy has been good before – Gone Baby Gone comes to mind – but he reaches a new level in Manchester By the Sea. Affleck’s brokenness manifests via emotionless, perfunctory action. 2 hours of that can get boring VERY fast. However, Affleck modulates his performance depending on who is around him just subtly enough that we see a man who uses what little personality he has left to put on a face for people so they don’t pester him. In addition, Affleck nails his big traumatic Oscar moments too. This movie succeeds because of how great Affleck is. Lucas Hedges is very good next to Casey Affleck. He mostly is relegated to comic relief, but he has some really strong range to show happiness, sadness, pain, etc. Michelle Williams continues her strong performance streak by inhabiting someone who shares Lee’s trauma, but carries a different level of grief. Kyle Chandler and C.J. Wilson also turn in strong supporting performances.
Are some traumas so great that a person can never recover? How does one deal with intense situations? How do high schoolers juggle two girlfriends? Manchester By the Sea poses answers to these questions and many more. One question it doesn’t really answer: why would you ever want a boat in Manchester? The movie makes it seem like its perpetually winter. Weird.