the messenger

the messenger is, as one expects, replete with back-at-home war movie clichés, but i found it extremely affecting nonetheless, mostly because it’s about tender feelings, confusion, and mildness rather than blown-up warrior hurt and over-the-top drama. woody harrelson and ben foster play two soldiers assigned to the Casualty Notification Team, the folks who are in charge of telling next-of-kin that a soldier was killed in combat. woody’s character, capt. stone, was in desert storm but never got hurt; foster’s character, staff sergeant will montgomery, is just back from iraq where he was injured by the IED that killed a fellow soldier. ben foster is the kid who played claire fisher’s sort-of boyfriend in six feet under, but while in six feet he was weedy and scuzzy looking, here he’s buff, clean, strong, and surprisingly handsome.

unfortunately, there aren’t many notifications to be seen in the messenger because the film soon gets stuck on the unlikely attraction between will and a widow he and stone notified near the beginning (played with great nuance by samantha morton). me, i would have liked the movie to hit us with notification after notification, people falling apart, getting enraged, going catatonic, or incongruously apologizing to the notifying team while will and stone follow the script and try not to get emotional. in fact, i would have liked to see will and stone not get emotional at all, but do this with a sort of sadistic (if restrained) glee, because, honestly, i think this would be the way i would handle the job — by transforming the excruciating task of telling people their lives are over into the self-righteous mission of handing people tough but honest truths. i would handle it by feeling strong and good and omnipotent. i think we do see this kind of sadistic detachment in medical dramas all the time, no? doctors and nurses don’t fall apart when they tell families that their loved one didn’t make it. generally, instead, they are merrily chomping hot dogs and guzzling beers by the next scene.

but first time director oren moveman goes the emotional route, and both stone and young will are deeply unsettled by having to deliver bad news after bad news.

here’s what i liked, though. ben foster has a great capacity to convey emotion through his facial muscles, in particular a little twitchy thing he does with his eyes whereupon his eyelids sort of flutter as if he couldn’t bear to keep them open. he’s a sweet looking, almost pretty actor, and moveman uses that to great advantage. unlike other war movies, this is not about rage but about quiet grief and slow processing. instead of outbursts of violence, you get conversations. when will gets close to the morton character, he wants to help. he begs her to let him help her. he really wants to do things for her, pack boxes, wash dishes, anything. in the only scene in which they get physically close, they nuzzle each other’s faces for what feels like 5 whole minutes without even brushing lips. they both carry great grief, and the film intelligently spares us the further violence of quick fucks and broken hearts. in another scene, a father who reacted angrily and abusively to news of his son’s death finds the team and apologizes. grief doesn’t have to be a lonely affair whose only resolution is the muzzle of a gun, but it can be soothed with painstaking kindness, gentleness, and together. it is this hopefulness i liked.