The winter of 2018 featured a flurry of upstanding films exploring addiction — from Beautiful Boy to A Star Is Born and now Ben Is Back, starring Julia Roberts and Lucas Hedges.
In fact, addiction is a subject rarely explored by Hollywood, highlighted by my post three years ago on the Top Ten Most Authentic Films About Addiction that spans the decades. Instead of a one-off movie about addiction, this year we have three — testament to the opioid crisis that has come to the forefront on the pages of magazines, newspapers, and websites, as well as on the small screen in TV news.
Ben Is Back director Peter Hedges (father of Lucas Hedges) should be commended for weighing in on a difficult topic that is an all too familiar reality for some viewers.
A glimpse into the world of addiction, Ben Is Back reinforces the idea that addiction is a family disease, which may be news to those unfamiliar with addiction and recovery but not so much for us addicts and members of the recovery community. However, Roberts’ visceral performance as a deeply concerned mother of a 19-year-old opioid addict carries the film. The sadness, distress, and heartbreak in her eyes and the anger in her voice are incredibly moving.
Lucas Hedges plays the titular Ben, a late-teenage opioid addict with a checkered past. Ben returns home on Christmas Eve after a stint in rehab and a couple months living in a sober house. Scared her son may relapse, Holly (Roberts) says to Ben, “You get one day. For 24 hours, you’re all mine. Got it?” The film takes place over those 24 hours, with the caveat that Ben return to sober living after one day. Holly vows to keep a sharp eye on him, even leaving the bathroom door open as he pees into a cup to test his sobriety. She also hides all of her jewelry and cleans out the medicine cabinet for his stay.
On a trip to the mall to shop for some decent clothes to wear to a Christmas Eve church service, Ben encounters a couple of old associates he knows from his drugging days. The meeting triggers him and he immediately calls his sponsor, who tells him to go to a meeting.
I will say this: The portrayal of the Narcotics Anonymous meeting is one of the most authentic I have seen on screen. The mentality of the support group is tangible, including the end-of-meeting mantra that is chanted: “Keep coming back, it works if you work it.”
After the run-in with his old cohorts, the secret is out that Ben is home. Ben owes money to several dealers, who now know he is back in town.
After church, Ben, his mom, his stepdad, and three siblings return to find the house broken into and the family dog gone. Holly and Ben go on a quest to find their dog, presumably stolen by one of Ben’s shady “friends.” Along the way, the two visit various trap houses and other places that once comprised Ben’s old heroin stomping grounds.
The dog premise is a bit hokey. Why would someone steal a dog and not other valuable items from the family’s home? But that’s what happens.
And after stopping at a gas station, Ben steals his mom’s car, leaving her behind, and relapses on heroin. Agonized, his mother embarks on a new quest to find her son. Roberts plays miserable quite convincingly, and her tough love is tantamount to the film’s overbearing narrative.
There is a scene involving Narcan, the pharmaceutical used to revive opioid overdose victims. I can’t say I have seen that depicted on film, so in that sense, it is an eye-opener to some who may not know about the power of the rescuing drug.
With her dramatic, urgent posture, Julia Roberts owns this film. It’s as if we the audience are experiencing her desperation, her pain, her frustration.
There are several conclusions to be drawn from Ben Is Back. One is that OxyContin and other prescription opioids are gateway drugs: Ben became hooked on opioids after a snowboarding accident when he was 14.
The movie is also a testimony to how the opioid addiction can affect any community, even the NYC suburbs of wealthy Westchester County. Opioids are everywhere and they don’t discriminate based on social hierarchy, race, or class. That’s one of this film’s biggest takeaways. While the acting is profound, Ben Is Back offers little more than a cautionary tale, albeit with fine performances.
