This image released by Roadside Attractions and Amazon Studios shows Casey Affleck in a scene from "Manchester By The Sea." Affleck was nominated for a Golden Globe award for best actor in a motion picture drama for his role in the film on Monday, Dec. 12, 2016. The 74th Golden Globe Awards ceremony will be broadcast on Jan. 8, on NBC. (Claire Folger/Roadside Attractions and Amazon Studios via AP)

At the beginning of Kenneth Lonergan’s “Manchester by the Sea” we meet Lee Chandler (Casey Affleck), a strangely awkward and mysterious loner. He fixes leaky faucets, paints walls and caulks tubs for the many apartment residents he does janitorial work for. Every night after getting off of work, he goes to the bar. When a women hits on him at the bar he ignores her; when two others stare, he fights. He’s in dire need of affection but entirely adverse to it.

Then he gets a phone call. His brother, Joe (Kyle Chandler), had a heart attack. He gets in his car, informs his employer, and drives from Boston to Manchester-by-the-sea. He arrives an hour later and discovers that his brother has died. Then, as he takes the elevator down to the morgue to identify his body, reality fades to memory, as it often does in relentlessly heartbreaking fashion. From these memories we learn that Joe was diagnosed with congestive heart failure and that he had five to 10 years left.

It’s not Joe’s death that is the central conflict to “Manchester by the Sea” but the catalyst to all of the emotional devastation you’ll experience watching it. It’s something else Lee is grieving that has happened long ago that causes the most pain.

“Manchester by the Sea” is a movie about many things — grief, guilt and responsibility, chief among them — but it’s also about the traumatic experiences that can be associated with places. After Lee arrives at his destination early on, he’s greeted with the abject awareness of his peers. When he picks up nephew, Patrick (Lukas Hedges), now fatherless, at hockey practice to let him know his father has passed on, his coach quips, “so that’s Lee Chandler.” Everyone knows him and what he’s done — except for us, the audience — and their glares are nothing more than a reminder of what Lee has gone through or done.  There’s a mystery that surrounds the nature of his subdued character that radiates from the screen. He’s treated and judged from a distance as both a sympathetic figure and a horrible person. But no one is harder on him than himself.

Casey Affleck’s performance is a one of nuance and understanding, one which showcases his ability to display a variety of complex emotions so clearly and so quietly. There are no abrasively loud dramatic moments, no intensely reaching Oscar hungry scenes or heightened obstacles to overcome. “Manchester by the Sea” is largely about facing your past, and helping others when it becomes their present.

And the film navigates through these scenes by forcing Lee and his nephew, Patrick, through the mundane and tedious errands that follow death. We see Patrick get dragged to funeral homes, learn that his father’s body is being frozen until the ground is soft enough to bury him and to his father’s lawyer, where we learn that Lee has been given gaurdianship over him.

Affleck is, at this point, the front runner and likely winner of the Best Actor prize at this year’s Academy Awards, but Lukas Hedges (who’s shown up in a couple Wes Anderson movies) is the one that’ll most surprise you, and he’s got the dramatic — and comedic — chops to rival Affleck.

And it must be said how astonishingly heartbreaking and effective Michelle Williams is in her minor but significant role as Lee’s ex-wife.

“Machester by the Sea” is a movie that carries moments that come out of nowhere and bring a world of emotional weight down you. It’s a movie about real people, places and feelings, and it’s a must-see.