Aswell as being a legend of the Modern American theatre with three plays now rightly I feel referred to as seminal classics of the medium; This is Our Youth, Lobby Hero and The Waverly Gallery, Kenneth Lonergan has also written and directed three of the finer films of the past 20 years. Each one a sobering drama built on frequently devastating and consistently powerful stories of human grief, strife and ultimately hope. Longergan’s words and direction have breathed beautiful life into portraits of people frozen in pain and suffering like no other director, never sacrificing humour, heart or humanity in his quest to create truthful and soulful stories that effect me to this day no matter how many times I watch them. The first of these masterpieces was of course 2000’s You Can Count on Me.

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You Can Count on Me (2000)

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After a startlingly abrupt opening You Can Count on Me kicks off Kenneth Longergan’s career on film in startling fashion. Lonergan was asked many times why he brought the story of a brother and sister later in life after the tragic death of both of their parents to the world of film rather than his usual home of the theatre. In actuality You Can Count on Me did start out as a one act play consisting of an elongated version of the pivotal early scene where our brother meets with our sister for the first time in many years, before revealing a prison stint, a troubled period of life, aswell coming up broke once more and needing money, before they both come to the conclusion its best for him to stay for some time in their home town, together. ‘Together’ being of course the key word for the entire film, even seen in the poster; a beautiful image of brother and sister in a locked embrace. Of Longergan’s three films, this is perhaps his simplest, it also happens to be his shortest. Margaret is indeed an epic, spanning multiple hours and multiple different plotlines. Manchester similarly, although at a shorter length, spans a great deal of time with a beautiful and haunting weaving of flashbacks and current story. Count on Me however comes in just under two hours and plays out without much diversion from the chief story at the heart of the film, that of Sammy and Terry. We do follow for brief moments small scenes with other pivitol people in each of these people’s lives, however for this film we always return to the core relationship. Longergan here is telling a tale of comfort that knows no bounds. The film’s title alone, a phrase so synonymous and oft spoken that it sometimes can lose its meaning. Here however in the films beautifully effecting final scene the phrase is eluded to, but never said. It doesn’t have to be. The power of Sammy and Terry’s relationship lies in the unspoken and eternal everlasting bond that they share, no matter what or who comes between them or up in their lives.

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In this breakout Sundance hit our brother and sister come to us played by two icons of both the American stage and both the American independent and commercial movie world.; Laura Linney and Mark Ruffalo. Linney as Sammy, a single mother long since departed by her scumbag ex caring for her child Rudy Jr., played by Rory Culkin. Ruffalo as Terry, the charming and affable brother who has been travelling around for so many years, he doesn’t really have a home apart from his birth town which welcomes him then and again. The tenderness, elegance and truth of these three key performances really is sublime. Longergan’s writing is so often commented on as realistic to the point where improvisation seems more likely than a core screenplay, however time and time again actors and directors come to the bench to declare just how specific and triumphant his screenplays really are. This is not to say that the script does all the work, but as Ruffalo and Linney have commented themselves more than once, it does lend one to get in touch more powerfully with the effect these words can and do have on an actor and any audience member watching. Even Culkin delivers a very mannered and quiet performance, simply perfect for his role. Lonergan’s longest friend and one of the only actors to appear in all three of Longergan’s films is Mathew Broderick, who has a turn here in perhaps his best performance in all three films as Brian, Sammy’s new manager at her bank, who she promptly starts having an affair with. Sammy’s thwarted love-life is the second key to the film, however the core plot does revolve around in many ways the multiple similarities between Terry and Rudy, and where Sammy’s loyalties must ultimately lie in the game of protecting and raising her son, aswell as protecting and helping her brother find his place in the world. It’s a truly beautiful tale, elegantly told with truth and compassion. An absolutely beautiful debut.

Margaret (2011)

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Caught for years in disputes regarding its length and running time, it took over 4 years until Kenneth Lonergan got to release the 3 hour intended version of his dramatic masterpiece Margaret. The tale of a college student who witnesses and has a profound effect upon a bus crash that takes the life of a woman in the middle of a very busy New York day. Prior to the crash the film takes its time setting up the naivety of our youthful lead Lisa, played by Anna Paquin, in a role written largely for her after Lonergan saw her in the critically acclaimed London production of This is Our Youth. Then suddenly over the course of one horrifyingly traumatic sequence we see this ‘girl’ grow into a woman, deeply affected naturally by the sensational horrors of what she just witnessed, including holding the dying woman and having her confuse Lisa with her own daughter of the same name in her dying confusion. Although her on-screen time is less than two minutes, Allison Janney appears as this dying woman and the power of performance in its startlingly small dose fuels the course of the rest of the film to no end. What now begins after this point is a somewhat montage-esque and wide reaching tale of Lisa coming to terms with her grief, aswell as attempting to get some form of retribution for Janney, primarily aiming to have the bus driver fired. Along the way this tale intertwines with Lisa’s school life as she traverses relationships, her virginity and ultimately a pregnancy. The many, many characters that come in and out of Lisa’s life in this tale range from the most incidental, to quite possibly some of the people that will have the biggest effect on her life ever. Lonergan manages to weave this tale with such stunning expertise that one never ponders the running time. I can only imagine what the ‘butchers’ 2 hour cut of this film would look like, but I do feel there is such a thing as a justified epic, and any film of such a long running time must justify their length, with its multiple plotlines and its many characters (all of which are intriguing, interesting, with their own arcs within them) Margaret certainly does just that.

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What becomes very quickly clear and only cements its intention in the films conclusion is that the core of the film is the relationship shared by Lisa and her mother Joan, played by J. Smith-Cameron, in a role written specially for her by her husband Lonergan (who does appear as Lisa’s absentee father). The richness and complexities of their relationship splits at points as they both go about their own discoveries, but does come together in a truly beautiful and deeply emotional final moment. The film is filled to the absolute brim with stars and stars, all in roles either specifically written for them by Lonergan, or cast so perfectly that you could have thought that they were also the intended performer. Ranging from Matt Damon to Mark Ruffalo to Mathew Broderick to Jeannie Berlin to Jean Reno to Josh Hamilton to Kieran Culkin. Every role is written with such depth of character and humanity, aswell as warmth and humour at several points, that the film as aforementioned does weave such tremendous web that we cannot help but be wholly invested. However one could comment that Margaret falls into the line of the Altman ensemble features epics of previous years, here there is Paquinn’s Lisa at the core of the film, leading us the whole way. As she does indeed lead us through this elegantly told, painfully truthful, montage mosaic of grief, suffering, hope, love and pain.

Manchester by the Sea (2016)

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When I sat down to see this film on a cold and rainy day in Wakefield, I actually had no idea what this heavily Oscar-tipped at the time film was about. A great pleasure to a man who finds out most everything about a film prior to watching it just through magazines and being a film fan. Little did I know the power of the journey that I was about to be taken upon. I wept for days after and still weep when I think of the film, never mind when I watch it. As we have seen in this article alone there is a lot to be said for a story simply told, but then there is also a lot to be said for a movie that so exquisitely crafts a weaving of different timelines to present a whole and simply wonderfully elegant portrayal of the pain of grief consuming a man’s life wholly. This film of course won Lonergan his more than deserved first Oscar and one can hardly argue with the win, with Manchester’s impeccable balance of humour and drama as it tells the story of Lee Chandler, a man who has experienced more than his fair share of grief in his tragic past, as he returns to his hometown to care for his nephew following his brother’s death. The film was originally a concept arrived at by a combination of thoughts between two of the producers of the film, Matt Damon and John Krasinski, with Damon originally intended for the role of Lee. They brought the concept to Lonergan who developed the film and made it into the gloriously brilliant film we have today. A mixture of different reasons led to Casey Affleck being cast in the role that would win him a Best Actor Oscar. Another undeniable win in my eyes. With his performance being perhaps the strongest element in a film overflowing with precision and clear brilliance of film-making. The performance really is a masterclass in subtlety, so extraordinarily delicate, powerful and sure. The flashback structure that the film adopts so sparingly and with such painful effect is the thing that gives immense and unbearable weight to the at times soulless eyes that Affleck’s Lee holds. The film also puts the pending burial of Lee’s brother (played similarly greatly by the always great Kyle Chandler) as a looming ghost over the film, with the ground far too frozen to attempt it. This state of limbo and the physical inability to bury the dead is a perhaps obvious, but nowhere near un-affecting metaphor that encompasses the film with an elegance that doesn’t usually become a lot of these grief dramas.

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So many of these sorts of dramas can’t wait for the loud shouting acceptance scene, but here the closest we get are a few deeply pained sobs and disparate mumbles – Manchester tells it’s story with the sort of brand of realism that makes documentaries seem mute, with its further adoption of cinematic styling and almost operatic use of classical music, all in the ultimate succeeded aim of encompassing the ungodly feeling of unbearable misery. Michelle Williams blesses us with less than 12 minutes screen time and makes more of an effect with those than certain other actors in the film. I guess I should comment that for many years now I have always felt that Lucas Hedges was slightly underwhelming in the role of Patrick, Lee’s Nephew, with many notes of pathos ringing a touch false, especially in a film with such a powerful grasp on the delivery of its emotions. Hedges is certainly enjoyable as the fumbling teenager, but struggles when that teenager must come face to face with the adult world, and although this is of course is the struggle of the character himself, many scenes feel less intentional than that. Manchester by the Sea however really is a modern day masterpiece and is a film that I beg you to return to if you fall into the crowds of those who brandished it as ‘misery porn’. Those sort of comments infuriated me then and infuriate me now, this is film that is far smarter and far more profound, and frankly far more human than those comments brandish it to be.

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Many like to make the cheap joke that they wouldn’t ever watch some of Longergan’s films more than once, building around his work a depressing ‘one and done’ sentiment making one believe that his films are so painful in their truth and so deep in their studies of grief that they can only be sat through once in a lifetime. I couldn’t agree less, maybe I’m just morose but these three films are ones that I do indeed watch repeatedly – for in that repetition more than grief is found, repeatedly one finds that it is infact hope that is the resounding factor lying at the core of the marvellous films of this seminal modern auteur, absolutley above anything else.

-         - Thomas Carruthers