By Liz Alper

Photo via patch.com

January 10, 2017 (San Diego) - As a New England native, I felt I had an obligation to see this film.  As someone whose mother’s friend was running in the Boston Marathon at the time of the bombings, I had to see this film.  As someone who has family in Massachusetts, I had to see this film.  

I still remember the watching first Boston Bruins game after the bombing.  During the anthems, the entire TD Garden was silent.  Rene Rancourt began to sing and after "were so gallantly streaming," he stopped.  The crowd took it from there.  They carried Boston Strong flags as the American flag danced on the ice and on the junbotron.  I'm from New Hampshire, but I've spent a lot of my life in Boston and I call it my city too and I've never been more proud of my city than I have in that moment.

To this day, four years later, my cousin, who lives in Merrimac, Massachusetts, says she’s afraid to go into Boston.  Not to take her son to a Red Sox game or anything.  Her story and so many others are why I feel it was an excellent idea for Mark Wahlberg (a Boston native) to put this event on film.