If Manchester by the Sea can be said to have a main visual motif, it is the harsh cold of winter. From the mounds of snow that Lee (Casey Affleck) shovels as he is introduced in the present, to the wispy breath of men struggling to get out of the chill, to the frozen ground that ultimately proves vital in the narrative, Kenneth Lonergan and cinematographer Jody Lee Lipes make plain the frigid backdrop where the film is set. But the content is anything but frozen; the setting informs but does not define the characters, their dreams, and their hang-ups. Against this harsh backdrop, Lonergan crafts something truly astonishing, a movie whose seemingly conventional nature only enhances its grasp of humanity.
Throughout his films, but especially in Manchester by the Sea, Lonergan works in paradoxically compatible modes of quotidian, often humorous interactions and devastating traumas.
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