Entertainment, Movies - Air Force Times

War’s saddest moments move ‘The Messenger’

Army Capt. Tony Stone has the toughest job in the military: Notifying families that their loved ones have died in battle.

Director Oren Moverman might have had one of the toughest jobs in Hollywood: Make a war movie with no explosions, no guns and a neutral political message.

But his latest film, “The Messenger,” starring Woody Harrelson as the hardened Stone, succeeds where so many other war movies have failed, by objectively weaving together the delicate story of two soldiers who must confront their own demons while performing an important, if unpleasant, job.

In the film, their duty is simple: Come into a person’s life for a few short minutes, break the most devastating news they will ever hear, and then leave. Stone does his job well, usually without incident.

Staff Sgt. Will Montgomery (Ben Foster), wounded while serving with heroism in Iraq and new to the Army’s casualty notification duty, his own horrific memories still as fresh as the scars on his body, is less by-the-book. He even goes so far as to embark on a tentative relationship with a widow (Samantha Morton) whose home he has visited with news of her husband’s death — an extreme breach of protocol that rankles Stone to no end.

The two soldiers share little in common but duty. But that duty is so incredibly intense that it trumps most of their differences.

Harrelson and Moverman spoke to Military Times recently about making the film.

“This is definitely one of the most intense movies I’ve been involved with, period,” Harrelson said. “Just in terms of how much it made me feel and how emotionally connected I felt. It was all-consuming in a really great way.”

At the end of the day, the role took a toll on the actor.

“My character’s supposed to be very tough,” he said, “so I would play it tough, but then he’d say ‘cut’ and I’d just start bawling. I was so connected to it. I used to joke ... after [the family member] finishes crying, I start.”

“The truth in it is — we hope — the emotional truth,” Moverman said. The two spent time at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C., and with casualty notification officers to gain a better understanding of their subjects. To achieve realism, many of the notification scenes were not rehearsed.

“It was a good way to go, even though I kind of like rehearsal,” Harrelson said. “It was great that Oren decided to shoot these things with one camera, one take. It was really kind of open in that sense. We didn’t really know what would happen. And I think it made those notifications feel much more genuine than if they had been rehearsed.”

The film has been well-received among service members, the two say, partly because of its realistic portrayal of military life.

“We’ve heard nothing but good things,” Moverman said, “but obviously it’s not an easy thing for a soldier to watch. On the other hand, it’s a lot more therapeutic than you would think. There’s a lot of hope in the movie, there’s a lot of love for the soldier.”

For his part, Harrelson was determined to get it right. “The viewpoint we were most concerned about was how soldiers would feel after they watch it,” he said. “Would they feel that it was authentic? Would they feel that we treated them right within the telling of the story? I just hope they feel like we did justice to what I think is an important story.”

In the end, “The Messenger” is a war movie with no explosions, told during a war that is still going on. But the explosions are emotional ones, and the battles come from within.

“The truth of the matter is that any soldier would recognize the fact that the shortest part of the war is the war itself,” Moverman said. “And if you survive it, you live with it for the rest of your life.”

“The Messenger” delivers what it has to say without sensationalism or political posturing. That restraint, along with the quality of the performances, makes it all the more powerful.

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Bill Goodykoontz of the Arizona Republic contributed to this report.

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Rated R for language and some sexual content/nudity. In theaters in limited release.