Arizona Reporter - Movie Reviews - 24/11
THE MESSENGER
Oscilloscope
Reviewed for Arizona Reporter by Harvey Karten
Grade: B
Directed by: Oren Moverman
Written By: Oren Moverman
Cast: Ben Foster, Woody Harrelson, Samantha Morton, Jena Malone
Screened at: Review 1, NYC, 11/3/09
Opens: November 13, 2009
If you have a son or daughter in Iraq, there are two people you dread seeing at your door even more than an IRS auditor or your in-laws. Those would be the pair of soldiers sent by the Secretary of War to inform the next of kin of the death of a veteran ten thousand miles away. While being under fire in Mosul or Baghdad is, to the say the least, an uncomfortable situation, staying here in the States to inform surviving kin of a death is hardly an easy job.
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Writer-director Oren Moverman, himself a vet, provides us with an involving education about the army program which is today considered a better alternative than the impersonal notifications that were sent to survivors courtesy of Western Union during the Vietnam War. This is not to say that the communication between the pair of messengers and the spouse or parent of a deceased soldier is up close and personal. In fact messengers are told not to share their grief, not even to touch the family members given the most shocking news of their lives. As played by Woody Harrelson in the role of Captain Tony Stone and Ben Foster as the novice in the communications area, Staff Sgt. Will Montgomery, the job is indeed a tough one since the aggrieved often blames the messenger, in one case getting spit upon and called cowards, in another being hit. In all but one situation the duo must watch the newly informed people break down in sobs and screams.
Aside from the way the film enlightens, this is a buddy movie about two people who are unequal in rank, fragile characters who let their inmost feelings emerge as they continue to hang out with each other not only on the job but in bars, in an auto, in a boat, on a pier. They start off as distinct personalities but as they let their hair down (a term used loosely in the case of Woody Harrelson’s character), becoming a true team, eager to be in each other’s company in what could be called a male-to-male romance, albeit a platonic one.
Harrelson performs in the role of a recovering alcoholic who has served for a while as a messenger stationed on an army base (actually filmed by Bobby Bukowski in Fort Dix and several New Jersey towns), while his unlikely teammate has been a war hero who risked sniper gunfire to rescue a fallen comrade. Sgt Montgomery has just three months to go before he must decide whether to re-enlist. Having been wounded, now requiring eye drops for an injury to his face, he is assigned by Col. Stuart Dorsett (Eamonn Walker) to learn the messenger’s job from a captain who appears reluctant to accept him. Montgomery is seething more because he found his ex g.f. Kelly (Jena Malone) engaged to another than from his battles under fire. The most intriguing part of the film deals with their bonding during off-hours.
As they hang out together, they gradually reveal open up with their feelings. For his part the captain is the sort who would say that a man never asks for directions, but under the influence of a couple of beers the two come across with stories that you’d hardly tell even to your best friend. Montgomery’s compassion is shown not only by the way he touches the arm of one victim’s parent but by the relationship he develops with Olivia Pitterson (Samantha Morton), whose husband had just died in Iraq but whose widow neither cries nor shows sorrow because, as she explains, he was no longer the man that she had married. We in the audience are guessing just how far the growing intimacy between widow and soldier will go.
The film was shown to some army officials who, according to production notes, appeared satisfied with the story particularly since the movie informs us about the human touch now in force for informing N.O.K.’s (next of kins). Woody Harrelson and Ben Foster develop a palpable chemistry which makes us wonder whether these two straight guys will ever find girlfriends that they’d prefer to be with.
THE MESSENGER (Oscilloscope)
Rated R. 105 minutes. © 2009 by Harvey Karten Member: NY Film Critics Online
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