Best Actress in a Supporting Role 2016: Michelle Williams in Manchester by the Sea

Michelle Williams received her fourth Oscar nomination for her performance as Randi in Manchester by the Sea.

Michelle Williams won quite a few awards from the critics and garnered a lot of nominations for her work in this movie and at some point during the awards season, when it was still unclear whether Viola Davis would have campaigned in the leading category or the supporting one for her performance in Fences, she was actually the frontrunner for the Oscar. When you watch the movie, the acclaim towards her performance might feel a little bit puzzling and truth to be told I really don't think this performance does actually live up to the hype generated by the critics: this is not at all because Williams does anything wrong in the role (and she actually makes the absolute most out of what she has to work it) but rather because the character of Randi is barely in the movie. Her screen-time is extremely limited: she appears in three not particularly long flashbacks, has a couple of very brief moments and then gets her big scene towards the end which is without a doubt the reason why her performance caused such a sensation. Her character is in the movie for too little to allow Williams to explore it in depth and truly flesh it out (and that's true for basically every other character in the movie not named Lee or Patrick) and I think it's a real pity because Williams does very well with what she is given. 

In the flashback scenes, Michelle Williams is very effective as just being an ordinary, common person living a fairly ordinary marriage. Her performance in those scenes is nicely relaxed and laidback and Williams impressively achieve the task of appearing completely realistic and true to life, which is not at all an easy thing to accomplish. She also shares a very effective chemistry with Casey Affleck - fittingly to the movie, the two never make Lee and Randi a unique couple matched in heaven: instead, they just make Lee and Randi a very normal married couple, creating the sort of playful, warmth-filled atmosphere in their sweetest moments together but also explosing the flaws of their relationship that does not quite always work. Williams is very good at portraying her character's weariness regarding Lee's occasionally reckless, even gratingly childlish behavior and in their very few moments they are shown together (and really I wish they had given them much more time to develop their relationship even better) the two actors perfectly realize both the good and the bad sides of Randi's and Lee's marriage. Another thing that limits Williams' performance is the movie's perspective: it's all seen from Lee's point of view so we really don't see much of Randi outside of Lee's perception of her - for example, we never see her grieving for the tragedy that strikes, tearing the family apart; we just assume she gets better with time, but we never actually see it. Williams is actually quite devastating in her portrayal of her character's intense desperation, hysteria and shock as she witnesses the horrifying event (that I won't spoil here), but after the brief moment in which we are shown her reaction we never get to see her journey of recovery.

In her few later scenes in the present days, Williams is again wholly solid in the role: in Randi's rare interactions with Lee (either by phone or in person), Williams projects the right sort of awkwardness but also an apparent maturity as Randi seems to be determined to bury the past. Which leads to her big scene towards the end of the movie, which is already sort of iconic and it's indeed the movie's highlight: I've already mentioned in my review of Lucas Hedges' performance that I'm not quite in love with this movie as many people are, but I can't deny that this scene is a masterclass in both acting and writing. When Lee and Randi accidentally run into each other, Williams is again terrific at conveying a certain embarrassment in her behavior due to their past together but also great at showing her determination to move on: their dialogue though soon degenerates into a messy breakdown on Randi's part, which is just perfectly portrayed by Williams. The actress is absolutely phenomenal at portraying her character' confused, unstable emotional state and she does this also thanks to her body language and facial acting - she is not an actress who cares about looking glamorous or beautiful when the part does not call for it, and in fact there's nothing glamorous or beautiful about the scene itself. Williams is excellent as she just feels so brutally realistic and raw in this scene and she is just brilliant at showing the scattershot emotions of Randi, her guilt over the things she said to Lee, her desperation as she tries to reconnect with him and realizes that he is not able to and her never-ending plight due to the past trauma that will never stop to affect her. She is the definition of heartbreaking in this scene and each of her line-deliveries couldn't be more perfect - her way of saying "My heart was broken... and it's always gonna be broken... And I know yours is broken too" with many pauses as her voice keeps breaking is devastating, and her "I should fucking burn in hell for the things I said" is a small moment of shocking intensity and unexpected brutality. It's a trily phenomenal scene and to say that Williams is amazing in it would be an understatement. 

This is a strong performance by Michelle Williams, who does the best she can to overcome the limitations of the script. She does not succeed, but she tries admirably and still manages to leave an unforgettable impression in her very short screen-time. She is wholly solid in most of her scenes and then absolutely delivers in her big scene, nailing every single emotional beat of this extremely tricky sequence. It's not an incredible performance and it's not my favorite performance from Williams of the year (that would be Certain Women), but it's still a pretty great performance in a flawed but still effective film.

4/5