Kenneth Lonergan is a kind of genius. There are more talented filmmakers formalistically, and there are screenwriters who have more power with words and how to use them, but there are so very, very few like Lonergan. His films’ hyper-realism recall aspects of Altman and Mike Leigh, but Lonergan’s three features are all so encompassed by their atmosphere of sadness. Tragedy is the director’s main language, and his understanding of tragedy’s role in our everyday lives is what makes him so special. His latest film, Manchester by the Sea, stars Casey Affleck as Lee Chandler, a brooding, short-tempered handyman living in a state of perpetual self-incrimination. His entire existence is haunted by grief, guilt and a level of self-hatred so severe he’s become numb. He’s a moving body with nothing much to live for outside a punishment he inflicts upon himself. He’s not guilty of a crime, but it doesn’t matter because he thinks he is. Lee’s self-imposed prison is a fierce, unforgiving lifestyle, and one that leaves him unprepared when a new wave of grief rushes upon him.

That new wave comes with news that his older brother, Joe (Kyle Chandler), has died of cardiac arrest. Joe had been diagnosed with congenetive heart disease, and was aware that his time was limited. When Lee gets the call, he’s shoveling snow in front of the building that he works for. He lives in a city outside Boston, but immediately drives to Manchester, his former home in the North Shore, where Joe lived with his son, Patrick (Lucas Hedges). Upon arrival, Lee goes to the hospital, talks to doctors, talks to a close neighborhood friend, George (C.J. Wilson), in order to set everything up and get the ball rolling. He tells his boss he will be in Manchester for a week, and it’s obvious that that’s a deadline he wants to keep. He voice is steady, his movements are mechanical. He doesn’t appear to be processing Joe’s death, but he actually is – in his own way. When you’re so overwhelmed by grief, a major tragedy might be easier to digest without blubbering. Lee wants no hiccups or drama, but he wants to do right by his brother and he also wants to make the situation right for Patrick.

Patrick is a handsome high school student, 16-years-old. He understood his father’s condition, was as prepared as he could be when he learns of his passing. He also posseses the kind of narcicism common in teenagers. His worries still concern his friends, school and maintaining relationships with two separate girlfriends without one finding out about the other. Lee did not sign up to be Patrick’s father, and is completely shocked to learn that Joe named him Patrick’s guardian in his will. Patrick’s mother, Elise (Gretchen Mol), is a troubled alcoholic who’s dropped out of the picture, George’s home is so filled to the brim with children that he cannot take on anymore, and all other family has moved out of the state. Lee feels set up, entrapped into moving back to Manchester, a city that used to be his beloved home, and now only brings him the misery of past sins too great to extinguish. His ex-wife, Randi (Michelle Williams), has remarried and still lives in town, but even outside of that, the small town ripples with tension at the presence of the notorious Lee Chandler. When we learn of Lee’s misdeeds – about halfway through the film – we can understand the controversy. And we can understand Lee’s inability to forgive himself.

Lonergan’s films have all been about a certain white middle class ennui, the type of deep-rooted melancholy that can only be present with the incredibly privileged. The major concerns for his characters are usually existential, not actual. Lonergan is aware of this. Put up against an equally brilliant film like Moonlight, we can see very clearly how disparate the issues of different cultures can be. Manchester, specifically, seems to deal only with the plight of white men, a group reacting so poorly to being ingratiated into marginalized groups that they just elected a racist game show host as President of the United States. It’s Lonergan’s understanding of these people, and their sadness, and their consciousness of their own mortality, that makes his films so incredible, and so unique. Lonergan began as a playwright, and that sharpness for humanity and its shortcomings is what makes his dramas so effective. He doesn’t need to craft the moods for his films, because his mood is everyday life.

This also plays into his use of humor, which is always present in his films and runs softly throughout several scenes in Manchester by the Sea. The film opens with a flashback to Lee on a boat with Patrick as a young boy as they fish. They joke and laugh and fish, while Joe steers the boat. Their closeness is so readily apparent, and we can see the lightness with which Lee used to carry himself before tragedy tore his life apart. Now, a new tragedy brings them back together, but shades of their biting, sarcastic personalities lay dorment beneath every conversation they have. It’s surprising how often you find yourself laughing when you’re bereaved. Sometimes, grief consumes so much that the only thing that there’s room left over for is laughter. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a film that better displays this phenomenon than Manchester. It helps that Affleck and Hedges play their scenes together beautifully, sharing a chemistry that gives this crushing drama a much needed comedic uptick.

Lonergan’s filmmaking is deceptively simple. His shots don’t move often. He likes to allow his actor’s to feel unrestrained. His films are usually scored by classical pieces, or songs from operas he enjoys. He’s not someone who overwhelms an audience with the audacity of a shot, but he is an impeccable filmmaker. With cinematographer Jody Lee Lipes, Lonergan stages the town of Manchester-by-the-Sea, Massachusetts in various ways. Its dreary, despotic winter colors the mood as Lee drives Patrick around town to keep the teenager’s life as normal as possible. In flashbacks, Lipes and Lonergan craft Manchester to look like paradise, the key to the happiness of the entire Chandler family. Nearly half of the film is in flashback, and editor Jennifer Lame constructs this brilliantly. There are no transitions or warnings for these ventures into the past, just pure, hard cuts. They play like torturous loops inside Lee’s mind. He’s become so unstuck in time (to use a Vonnegut-ism), with half his existence trapped inside those devastating moments – a trap he set up himself and willingly walks himself into. A cross-cutting sequence which begins when Lee initially learns the surprising news that he has been named Patrick’s guardian is both one of the most breathtaking and one of the most gut-wrenching things I’ve seen in a movie this year.

Casey Affleck has been out from under the thumb of his older brother Ben for close to a decade now. Casey will never be as famous as his brother, nor as classically handsome – he’ll never get cast to play Batman – but Manchester by the Sea all but confirms that Casey is amongst the true greats of screen acting today. His Lee is beyond depressed, he’s dessimated. He lives in a mental state beyond sadness, because sadness suggests that a time will come when sadness will end. He cannot believe he’s allowed to live after what he’s done, and so the few times a chance at happiness does arrive, he disallows himself the privilege. As a handyman, the people in his building occasionally get upset with him, sometimes they’re particularly friendly, but mostly he’s ignored like a piece of furniture. He prefers it that way. His work is not easy, nor is it the most dignified, and this is how he likes it, this is the life he’s chosen. Affleck’s portrayal of this is stunning, absolutely heartbreaking, and reticently charming. He’s taking Lonergan’s symbol of Catholic guilt and infusing it with an impassioned dispondency. It’s one of the best performances I’ve seen this year.

Supporting performances from Kyle Chandler, C.J. Wilson and especially Michelle Williams strengthen a tremendous ensemble cast, but this is mostly a showcase for Affleck and Hedges. The two play a certain form of familial relationship not commonly represented in films: the ambivalently alligned. Lee and Patrick are fused by memories and tragedies, but most importantly they are fused by family. The sequence of events in the film’s opening act lead the two men into a situation that neither planned for. This is a common thread through Lonergan’s work: life getting in the way. In You Can Count On Me, it was the surprise arrival from a troubled brother. In Margaret, it’s a shockingly violent event of randomness that leads a privileged high schooler to reexamine her whole existence. Both of those films are tempered, if a bit problematic, in their portrayals; and they’re also both masterpieces in their own way. Manchester by the Sea is another in what is proving to be a startlingly impressive collection of feature films from Lonergan. It stands as a peer next to his previous brilliant work, and shows that there is at least one masterful American filmmaker interested in hyper-realistic storytelling in cinema.

 

Written and Directed by Kenneth Lonergan