10 Most Emotionally Devastating Movie Moments Of 2016

Boasting a not too shabby 96% Rotten Tomatoes rating, a place on the American Film Institute’s top ten movies of the year and a total of five Golden Globe nominations plus a Best Actor win for star Casey Affleck, Keith Lonergan’s Manchester by the Sea has staked its claim as one of 2016’s most critically acclaimed films. It’s an undeniably powerful and moving meditation on loss, grief and healing throughout, but there’s one scene in particular that got people talking the most.

It’s a simple enough scene in which grieving father Lee (Affleck) bumps into his ex-wife Randi (Michelle Williams) on the street. At this point in the film, we know the pair share a complex and tragic past after the death of their three children in a housefire and this marks the first time they’re properly spoken since they split up years previously.

Old wounds are opened up and though Randi desperately wants to make amends to hurtful words thrown about after the tragedy and for Lee to forgive her, he’s still so grief-wracked that he can’t forgive himself let alone anyone else.

It’s one of those scenes in which not a lot happens or is said outright, but also one in which the character’s emotions – crippling guilt and grief, remorse, the fact they love each other still but can’t be together – shines through. Given Lonergan’s past as a playwright - he also wrote Manchester by the Sea’s screenplay - it’s not too surprising he’s able to craft scenes that are simple yet so full of power.