I don’t always review video games on this blog. Sometimes I review other things as well. Video games just happen to be a field I’m more experienced in. But if there is one thing that I require little encouragement, it is in providing my unsolicited opinion about topics in which I’m not adequately knowledgeable to provide.

Thus, let’s do a movie review this week!

Oscar season is nearly upon us. At least, I assume Oscar season is nearly upon us. Perhaps it has already happen and this discussion is merely academic between two handsome intellectuals like you, dear reader, and myself. In which case, the rest of my introduction is wholly unnecessary so let’s just get to the review on Manchester by the Sea.

As is often my style, I’ll give the short summary before going into detail: I liked it.

There, if that was all you needed from me to form an opinion about something then we’re done! See you next week!

For a more in-depth and tirelessly examination of why is going to take quite a bit longer. And, of course, necessitate spoilers.

I saw Manchester by the Sea almost two months ago. I realized I hadn’t seen much within the theatre that didn’t result in me complaining about big Hollywood blockbusters and how they’re morally and creatively bankrupt wastes of time design solely to fleece you of your money and return little more than a fleetingly saccharine experience. Manchester by the Sea is no such thing. It is, as we casuals like to say, an “artsy-farsty” movie. If you’re looking for big explosions, big set pieces and big noises then you’re going to be disappointed.

In fact, I had low expectations for the movie in the first place. By the time it actually released near me it was already generating a bunch of positive buzz but from the trailers I thought I had the movie pegged pretty squarely down: a redemptive story about some cold-hearted uncle returning to his ancestral home to raise his bereaved nephew and learning the importance of family, love, God and warm apple pie.

Ho, how wrong was I!

There’s a funny thing about expectation. Ofttimes it can be the most impactful element to determining your feelings on a piece of art. Usually I’m sorely disappointed because my expectations are well above what the artist is actually delivering. But there are the rare times when I completely misread a piece and am shocked to discover that it surpasses my expectations by doing something I never imagined and I didn’t even realize I wanted it to do.

Manchester by the Sea is such a movie. First, it’s a character piece. If you’re looking for a tight or compelling narrative then this is not the place for it. In fact, my earlier assumptions weren’t too far from the mark in what the actually story is about. But the thing with character pieces is that a simple story isn’t a detriment but often required in order to concentrate on the development and emotions of the character you’re examining. But the way that Manchester engages the audience is by exploring its character in a novel way:

They don’t talk about it.

Manchester by the Sea is more a movie of people not speaking than it is anything else. It’s both the source of the film’s greatest strengths and biggest missed opportunities. I have a keen interest in communicating without communication. Many of my stories involve characters that are either discussing some greater matter couched in a discourse over a petty incident or are telling a story through the things they won’t tell. So I was enraptured watching the film execute a technique with which I struggle constantly.

And the movie delivers on its method with varying success. I find it hard to believe that most audience goers don’t pick on this “lack of communication” element. It’s presented almost heavy-handedly but still manages to not be overbearing. I mean, the opening sequence with Casey Affleck working his janitorial job presents three instances of characters talking without directly talking.

You have the stilted conversation between the old man and Affleck as they stare at a dripping tap. In seconds you can get the older man’s frustrations as he tries to wrangle an answer for how he should fix the tap while Affleck – not being a plumber – refuses to say anything that could be held as a liability against him. Then, we see him fixing the toilet of a woman who is talking on the phone with a friend of hers in a neighbouring room where she’s going on and on about how she has a crush on her janitor and doesn’t know what she should do about it without realizing Affleck can hear every word. Then we have the most important (technique wise) conversation between Affleck and a tenant who thinks he’s being a pervert and trying to see her shower naked when in actuality he’s trying to tell her he simply needs to run the water to find where the leak is while getting more insulted with her insinuations.

The third interaction is perhaps the most important in my mind because it’s a moment where two characters are talking past each other. Presenting the audience with this technique early on and clearly is vital for the later interactions between characters to be understood. There’s a lot of moments in Manchester by the Sea where cross purposes are what lead to the tragedies its narrative encircles.

Following this rather lengthy opening sequence, we then see Casey Affleck go to a bar and turn down the advances of a single lady before displaying clear self-destructive tendencies by getting in a fight with two innocent bar goers. This clearly establishes Affleck’s character as a broken man from the start with the initial intrigue for the audience being the explanation for how he got there.

And this is the point where Manchester by the Sea sort of loses me.

I have no idea how this project was originally conceived by the pacing in its reveal of information seems rather disjointed to me. There are essentially three major hooks at the start of Manchester to draw the audience in to its unfolding story. These are, not in chronological order: why does Affleck have such a negative reputation in town, why is his nephew’s mother unable to be his guardian and why is Affleck self destructive? Unfortunately, two of these hooks are revealed by the end of the first act. The last of the hooks ends up being incredibly minor. We then have a large portion of the movie lurch between rather unnecessary scenes that reinforce what we’ve already learned by that neither advance the character’s arc or lead to a greater understanding of the situation.

And I can’t help but wonder if maybe this was the result of some editing room decisions. I want to say that Manchester by the Sea was originally conceived so that you never had a direct explanation for why Casey Affleck moved away from Manchester and is absolutely against raising his nephew. I feel like the movie meant for you to piece together a lot of vague scenes to come to the conclusion itself. Unfortunately, given what we have of the film, I could see in early screenings that a lot of audiences might be confused or unused to filling in the blanks themselves. Thus, a clear cut explanation was provided in a rather brutish and drawn out solution.

See, the worst part of the movie is when Affleck must sign the guardianship papers for his nephew. He then stares off into space as we go into a very long “flashback” sequence that illuminates us about why he’s self-exiled from his hometown. We learn of the tragic fire, the loss of his children and how he blames himself and tried to commit suicide. Then we hop back to reality and watch the rest of the movie unfold with the new understanding of his personal demons.

Except, so many of the scenes afterwards lose their poignancy because they mostly feel redundant. We see him try to get a job in Manchester but the wives of the men are adamant he shouldn’t be allowed within their stores. We know those minor characters blame him for the tragedy and think he’s irresponsible but this rather obvious conclusion was better represented in Affleck’s ex-wife’s sub-arc. We also have moments where he burns his pasta because he fell asleep on the couch and starts to panic. We know this is because it triggers his memories of the accident but it doesn’t make us feel any greater sympathy or emotional connection to the character. So much of the movie is this reinforcement of rather basic concepts already established that I can’t help but think they were the sole vessel for the narrative before.

If that were the case, I’d have really liked to see Manchester by the Sea without its flashback sequence. As such, I’d say that its pacing is easily the worst thing about the movie since there are many examples of small scenes that don’t do much but just remind you about characteristics of the principle characters that we already knew.

Now, the film still succeeds even with this clumsy editing. I think part of what makes Manchester by the Sea so powerful is that, ultimately, it’s not a redemption movie. We watch Affleck eventually fail to meet his duty to his brother and his family. The wounds inflicted by his past – all almost entirely self inflicted too – are simply too great for him to overcome. Here’s a dramatic moment that should transform a man and he shrinks away from it, retreating from the pain much like he was at the very start. It’s tragic and that’s what makes it work.

But as far as tragedies go, Manchester by the Sea is a fairly cerebral one. Ancient Greek tragedies were meant to put your emotionally through the wringer so that at the end you were utterly drained and left in a numbed state of catharsis. Manchester is a bit strange for its genre because it doesn’t really wring the emotions from you. I feel like it asks that you engage with the movie not emotionally but intellectually in order to understand what is happening. This is largely because, once again, no one is truly talking to each other. It’s like the whole movie is in passive voice and keeping you as detached from the involved emotions as Affleck is trying to be detached from his pain.

So… yeah. I enjoyed the film. It did something I could immediately recognize and in a way that was a little different to keep me intrigued. It’s experimental and from that experiment we see results not normally produced by traditional methods. It’s not particularly refined but I was engaged nonetheless. I would definitely say it’s Oscar worthy though I suspect it won’t be an Oscar winner.

But it has earned its acclaim. That is for certain.