i think death is a cheap way to create drama, but i endorse the film as very well put together. all the relationships were fun to watch, which is the most important thing since that was like 90% of it
[nitpicks]
- at a point the 'lee being infamous in town' mystery felt like they were just withholding information, and i never actually got why people felt that way but i'm sure i just missed something
- like cilly i also think they muddled conveying who died in the beginning but i was cool with the time jumps after that
- patrick was often stereotypically teenagery which felt unnatural
[/nitpicks]
mchekhov 2: Chek Harder wrote:i think death is a cheap way to create drama
I don't get this. Death is something everyone has to deal with, I don't see how that is cheap. It is only cheap if it is gratuitous and I don't think that in any way applies here.
Affleck gives the best performance of the year bar none. I still need to catch up on stuff but I doubt that will change for me.
mchekhov 2: Chek Harder wrote:i think death is a cheap way to create drama
I don't get this. Death is something everyone has to deal with, I don't see how that is cheap. It is only cheap if it is gratuitous and I don't think that in any way applies here.
Affleck gives the best performance of the year bar none. I still need to catch up on stuff but I doubt that will change for me.
my issue is very nuanced and i'm not even sure i agree with myself
even though obviously it was dealt with in a skilled way, i felt vaguely exploited having the death of Lee's brother and kids be the core of every conflict in the film. like the filmmakers were just pushing a 'sad' button in our brains. especially so when they used his kids' death as a reveal of his character, since using a chance incident to move a story forward is kinda lazy
Perhaps it's why I didn't manage to connect with the characters. I couldn't put my finger on exactly why, but now that you mention it I think the drama does feel a bit manufactured, at least in part.
One of those final shots where it shows the family gravestone and only Lee's name is missing clearly adds to this foreboding sense of depression and the inevitability of death/time.
But, I guess I didn't really understand the point of it. I know that's an easy criticism to make, but it comes closest to how I'd describe my experience. I went through the film waiting to connect to something or really feel for the characters but everything just sort of turned me off. Just on a very basic level, it's clear Lonergan, Affleck, and Williams gave fantastic performances, but there's a link missing there for me.
Like, it's akin to how I came away after The Revenant, though that film was certainly much more "on its own sleeve" than this.
It's like the entire film starts in medias res and sort of stays that way until it ends. If that was the intention it's certainly neat, but is it compelling?
@Cil Are you confusing Kenneth Lonergan and Lucas Hedges??
mchekhov 2: Chek Harder wrote:i think death is a cheap way to create drama, but i endorse the film as very well put together. all the relationships were fun to watch, which is the most important thing since that was like 90% of it
[nitpicks]
- at a point the 'lee being infamous in town' mystery felt like they were just withholding information, and i never actually got why people felt that way but i'm sure i just missed something
- like cilly i also think they muddled conveying who died in the beginning but i was cool with the time jumps after that
- patrick was often stereotypically teenagery which felt unnatural
[/nitpicks]
There has been many a family drama film which is centered around a funeral and of course drama ensues. Those are like my favourite guilty pleasures. With MbtS, yes death is definitely the catalyst - without it, there would not be a story. You call it cheap, I think it's valid.
It's fitting that death drove him away from Manchester and then death brought him back yo. And the ending where he cannot stay because he "can't beat it" is perfect. If Lee stuck around and had lunch with Randi and ladeedadeedah, would have come across as bullshit.
Regarding your nitpicks:
- There is a lot of stuff left unsaid about all the "THE Lee Chandler" comments. No one is actively telling the story (no narrator), all the information we get is from flashbacks and natural dialogue (It's my favourite thing about this screenplay). So it is only natural that people do not go around advertising the shit that has happened to them, especially Lee. In my mind the townsfolk obviously made him out to be the bad guy, because he admitted to causing the house fire and Randi was not supportive at all. It could be more than that, but yes it is a mystery to the audience. I don't mind hearing other theories...
- Now about Patrick: I too thought he was a bit too much with his wise-cracks all the time, but when you see the flashbacks Lee and Joe were the same - the shark jokes on the boat, the "What's a good disease?" scene - Patrick is not a brat, that's just what he grew up with. And the fact that Patrick feels comfortable being that way around Lee suggests that Lee isn't as estranged as I first thought.
On another note:
I love the catch by Cil about the head stone. I feel that Joe was the reason why Lee didn't just give up on life. And then at the end that was transferred to Patrick.
er, contrary to Keith's point, I actually think Manchester deliberately side-steps a lot of the death melodrama. Certainly conventionally speaking. What surprised me based on how the movie was marketed is that we don't have extended sappy sequences of tears and heartbreak and funerals and wakes and lingering conversations about death and the afterlife and all that stuff. There's almost none of that. There's almost no big heart to hearts. Almost no big "DRAMATIC" moments in the traditional Oscar-baity sense. Some, but there's only a few of them.
It's mostly people trying to pretend like they're totally normal but they're not and they're sad and alone. It's way, way more nuanced. And understated. And honestly sorta incredibly vulnerably human.
It's also not really about "DEATH" so much as how the living can learn to survive the dead. And how to try to untangle some of the mess of just trying to exist when you have to deal with your own mistakes along with everyone else's. I dunno. It wasn't really a regular death drama for me.
