Manchester by the Sea
Manchester by the Sea
7.896%78%
Lee Chandler is a brooding, irritable loner who works as a handyman for a Boston apartment block. One damp winter day he gets a call summoning him to his hometown, north of the city. His brother's heart has given out suddenly, and he's been named guardian to his 16-year-old nephew. As if losing his only sibling and doubts about raising a teenager weren't enough, his return to the past re-opens an unspeakable tragedy.
Scott Phelps reviewedMay 13, 2025
A hard-hitting and heavy subject matter in this dark drama, shows the harrowing torment of a broken Lee (Casey Affleck) due his own personal past tragedy whilst subsequently having to provide fatherly support for his nephew, leads us as a viewer to feel as emotionaly null to life as his character.
Throughout this film, there is an overridding sense of abandoment and monotony - reflected in it’s slower pacing and story-telling. With it’s only changing pace from this through “flashback” snippets of highly poignant memories, allowing us glimpses to why Affleck’s character displays such misery; void of all feeling to the world and those around him.
He carries with him such a self-reflective and weighty burden of guilt that has “beaten him”, that as an audience we empathise his suppressed pain even after being led to villianise him due to the traumatic events we’ve witnessed.
This movie for sure hit true that life can indeed be taken from us (or by us?) in such a quick manner, but the wake of such tragedy is forever and we’d never rightly be happy again.
A fantasic stark contrast to watching our lead (protagonist really doesn’t apply here…) go from being just a husk of a man, to being unwillingly thrust into a farther-figure role to console his nephew was by far the most gripping aspect of a “reality true” drama movie.
Although not up there with some of my favourite hard-hitting and emotionally choking dramas, and aside from it’s social-media driven hype; it definitely has it’s place amongst films that were worth watching. Ultimately, it left me satisfied with a well-told story, but somewhat craving further expansion of emotion which could be achieved through more significant powerful flashbacks to take it to that top tier list.