The Messenger

A interesting story about two men on the US Army's notification team--the men whose job it is to tell the next of kin that their love done is not coming back.

Ben Foster is Will Montgomery, a Army sargeant just returned from fighting in Iraq. He's recovering from injuries both physical and emotional when he's assigned to the death notification team. His commander is Captain (Woody Harrelson). An old hand at this, Captain Tony Stone job is to show Montgomery the ropes and teach him the rules. It's a tough job where your very presence brings grown men and women to tears. Yet as they say, somebody's got to do it.

We see the reactions of various families to the bad news they have to deliver. We also see how delivering this bad news on a daily basis affects the messengers. Will and Tony annoy each other, hate each other, respect each other and finally bond along the way.

Will breaks one of the cardinal rules by actually caring enough about one of the widows (Samantha Morton) he notifies to check up on her and her son. Neither seem to be sure of whether there is more to their relationship than that or if they want more than that or if its right to have more than that. This is a film with layers.

Screenplay by Alassandro Camon & Oren Moverman

Directed by Oren Moverman

This is also a film with some outstanding nudity.

Jena Malone has a sex scene with Ben Foster early on and then soonafter the curvy Lisa Joyce shows off what God gave her. The Lord was generous with both women and their scenes are quite welcome (though in one we do have to suffer Woody Harrelson's shiny bottom). However be warned not to miss the first ten minutes of this film or you will miss all the good nudity.

The film features a nice supporting turn by Steve Buscemi as a father crushed by the loss of his son and many other good touches. It made me wonder if this had been a play before it was made into a film. It's that kind of movie.

The film is well directed and Ben Foster is good in the lead, but if not for the gratuitous nudity, it would have been Woody Harrelson who steals the show, the same way he did in "Zombieland". Although he played the dumb Woody Boyd on "Cheers", Harrelson has shown in recent years what smart choices he's made and has delivered some wonderful performances, especially in support roles.

This was Oren Moverman's directorial debut.

This film is not for everybody. It's not a rah-rah pro military film, but neither is it part of the endless parade of anti-military, anti-Iraq films that Hollywood has been cranking out in recent years. Instead its an intelligent and thoughtful character study of two men given difficult jobs at best and the people who see them as messengers of death.