The Messenger

112 minutes

In his most powerful performance to date, Ben Foster stars as Will Montgomery, a U.S. Army officer who has just returned home from a tour in Iraq and is assigned to the Army's Casualty Notification service. Partnered with fellow officer Tony Stone (Woody Harrelson) to bear the bad news to the loved ones of fallen soldiers, Will faces the challenge of completing his mission while seeking to find comfort and healing back on the home front. When he finds himself drawn to Olivia (Samantha Morton), to whom he has just delivered the news of her husband's death, Will's emotional detachment begins to dissolve and the film reveals itself as a surprising, humorous, moving and very human portrait of grief, friendship and survival.

95% on the CINEMETER

92% - Nov 8, 2009

A brutally honest study of loss and moving forward, aided by tour-de-force, searing performances and beautiful handheld cinematography.
Greater New Haven Member

Moving depiction of grief, rage, loneliness. I liked the fact that it didn't stoop to becoming a tear-jerker - it maintained dignity with humor.
Greater New Haven Member

(from a Vietnam veteran): This is a film whose time has come (maybe past due). Attention must be paid to the tremendous psychological damage of war to soldiers and their extended families, which I feel most Americans choose to ignore, and which will be with us for years. I loathe this war.
Greater New Haven Member

BOS

98% - Nov 8, 2009

Painful but moving.
Boston Member

An unflinching look at grief and the ravages of these two wars.
Boston Member

Heroic in these times.
Boston Member

Oscilloscope Laboratories