The 9th Beijing International Film Festival will start tomorrow in Beijing and last for seven days, from April 13 to 20.
The theme of this year's event is: Home and Country, and a total of 15 films that meet the theme have been shortlisted for the "Temple of Heaven Award".
Today Pocket Cat brought one of the finalists, and I personally predict that the heroine of the film is very likely to win the "Temple of Heaven Award for Best Actress".
"Ben Comes Home"
The heroine of the film is Julia Roberts (52), who won the Academy Award for Best Actress in 2001 for "Never Compromise".
The male protagonist is Lucas Hedges (23 years old), who was nominated for the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor in 2017 for "Manchester by the Sea" (Douban 8.6 points).
In "Three Billboards," which was nominated for multiple Oscars in 2018, he played a mother and son with Francis McDormand, who won the Oscar.
The old and the young, who acted online, interpreted the important role of "home" in the process of "drug rehabilitation" with touching mother and child feelings in "Ben Is Home".
Addicted!
Do you think that every drug addict is exposed to drugs in a "bright" place like a bar?
With or without my knowledge, I took drugs for the first time and then couldn't extricate myself.
After becoming a "drug addict", he was accused by others of "doing it himself", "he should go to that kind of place", "how can self-love and self-discipline be like this".
It seems that it is all his/her fault that he/she went to the wrong place, met the wrong friends, and had no self-love self-discipline.
Actually, it's not all like this.
The reason why the male protagonist in the film is addicted to drugs makes it impossible to blame him.
He was addicted to drugs from an overdose of "painkillers" prescribed by doctors.
Many teenagers in the United States are addicted to drugs: first drunk, then smoked marijuana, then took painkillers, and finally got involved in sea loin.
In 1996, there was a painkiller in the United States, "OxyContin", which was called "heroin pills" by industry insiders, and because of several cases of taking addiction, the drug was adjusted.
In this regard, some people pointed out that "not only children, but also medical workers should strengthen their understanding of the side effects of painkillers." ”
"Ben Is Home" tells a story of "how to save drug-addicted youth" in this realistic background.
At the age of 14, Ben suffered a slight injury while skiing, and when his mother asked in advance whether he would become addicted, the doctor promised that he would not, and kept increasing the dose, and as a result, he became addicted.
And the doctor, because there are too many patients, can't remember what Ben looked like.
The doctor's negligence makes the child fall into the abyss of drugs.
In his lifetime, he is likely to die young because of "drug use to death", like most drug addicts.
If he doesn't have a happy and loving family.
Quit your addiction?
Fortunately, Ben had such a "home".
Ben lives in a restructured family, where he and his sister follow their mother and form a new family with another man, with two small children.
The family has a good relationship.
As the oldest boy in the family, he was supposed to be the "umbrella" for his younger siblings, but because of the doctor's negligence, he could only stay in the drug rehabilitation center.
On Christmas Eve, Ben went home.
Because his mother once told him that the wish for Christmas was that he could come home.
The moment she saw Ben, her mother Holly hugged him for a long time and did not want to let go.
But apart from his mother and two younger siblings who are not yet sensible, who are happy about his return, 17-year-old sister Ive and his stepfather expressed great "concern" about his appearance.
Because there are many things in the family that can remind him of the past and trigger "relapse".
Ivey and her stepfather are tough in advocating that Ben return to the drug rehab immediately, so Holly compromises with both father and daughter.
Because Ben's return has ruined more than one Christmas, the family said in a desperate mood that they would "no longer have any expectations".
But the stepfather eventually agreed to Ben staying, perhaps because he couldn't bear to see his wife sad.
Holly and Ben Law Chapter Three: Not allowed to leave her sight.
Happy Ben insisted on hand-picked gifts for his younger siblings, so Holly accompanied him to the mall to shop.
At the mall, Ben meets a friend who used to take drugs together, and ben begins to become nervous when his eyes are looked at each other.
Taking the initiative to tell his mother that he was going to the "mutual aid club" because he had the idea of "taking drugs", Holly was very pleased to see Ben's positive drug rehabilitation attitude.
While out of the Mutual Aid Club to buy clothes, Holly finds Ben holding a bag of drugs in his hand, which Ben explains to him by a girl from the Mutual Aid Club.
Holly was furious when she saw the drugs and took her son directly to the cemetery, where he told him where he wanted to be buried.
If there is no drug rehabilitation, then the untimely death of "drug addiction" is ben's end.
Will you go to the cemetery at the age of 20 to pick a place for yourself? No, what you will do at this time is only likely to visit the graves of others.
But 20-year-old drug users should think about it, if you can't quit drugs.
The "cemetery play" arranged by the director directly and strongly expresses the distance between "drugs" and "death", which is very close.
Save the kids!
Holly takes Ben home from the cemetery and doesn't tell anyone else about the drug discovery.
Originally thought that this Christmas Eve could be spent safely, the family returned from the church, but found that the home was in chaos.
Nothing was lost, just the pet dog in the house was gone.
Ben liked the dog very much, and when sharing his experience of drug rehabilitation at the mutual aid meeting, he said that he was in drug use because he had a love for the dog that he did not completely indulge himself.
Dogs were Ben's "life-saving straw".
It was obviously directed at the original.
On the way to find the dog, Holly knew a lot of truth.
The drugs in Ben's hand were not given to him by the girls at the mutual aid party, but were found in the storage room at home, where Ben used to store the drugs.
Ben has been lying
He was just saying things that others liked to hear to create the illusion that he had successfully rehabilitated from drugs.
This is shown in great detail in Pretty Boys.
"Pretty Boy", starring Sweet Tea, is also a movie about "drug rehabilitation".
Every word that Sweet Tea, who has a handsome face, says in the movie is more convincing than that of a child with average looks.
Not just his parents, but everyone in the audience who watched the movie, was cheated on by this beautiful boy again and again, but would still believe his lies.
It wasn't until he himself was eroded by drugs that he had no patience to lie that he let everyone see his "rotten" self and reality.
The contrast between beauty and ugliness is a way for "Pretty Boy" to warn everyone to beware of "drug rehabilitation" lies.
"Ben is Back" is expressed through the deep feelings between mothers and children.
Holly's affection for her son as a single mother goes beyond the usual mother-child relationship.
The son is very good in her eyes, no. 1 who can be a "leader" among friends, and if it were not for the accident of "painkillers", he would have had a good future.
Even if her son becomes a "drug addicted teenager", she is still planning a brilliant future after successful drug rehabilitation.
Ben was indeed a good boy, he knew Holly's hard work as a single mother, and he tried not to worry his mother.
He may have lied just to reassure his mother, but when he found out that his home had been robbed and he would put his family at risk, he began to give up on himself: I would only mess everything up.
The child loves the mother very much, loves the family very much, and the mother loves the child very much.
A loving "home" is destroyed alive by "drugs".
But there are worse things in life.
Ben's history teacher gave Ben "drugs" for a long time because his mother had cancer and he had a lot of "painkillers."
I thought that the teacher would use knowledge to water the child, but I did not expect to use "drugs".
Here, the director arranged actions such as "Holly stopped and vomited" to reflect the indictment of this kind of thing.
Doctors and teachers, who are labeled "angels", have inadvertently or intentionally become accomplices to children's "drug use".
So sometimes, "drug use" is not the fault of the child alone, but everyone's responsibility.
Save the child, because he's not the only one who makes the mistake!
Don't give up a drug addict's life, he should live!
Ben eventually learns that a drug gang took the dog.
It turned out that in the mall, the news of Ben's coming out of the drug rehabilitation center was spread by a friend he met, and the drug trafficking gang threatened Ben with a dog to transport drugs.
The drug dealers are vicious and Ben decides to go alone, but Holly insists on going along.
She wants to protect her son.
But Ben took the opportunity to leave alone.
The loss of contact with the son who is addicted to drugs is a relief in the eyes of some parents, but in the eyes of other parents, it is "heart-wrenching".
A family is not just a child, will parents ignore other children for the sake of children who are addicted to drugs?
This is a difficult question to answer.
After transporting the drugs, he found the dog's Ben, took a bag of drugs rewarded by the drug trafficking leader, and decided to commit suicide under the self-blame of his family and the temptation of drugs.
Passers-by call Holly and see Ben lying there with the injected drugs, Holly does not give up, she eventually saves her son.
The film is a Happy ending.
Within 24 hours of Ben's return home, the director used a unique lens language to accurately convey to the audience the warmth of the beginning of the reunion to the danger of being robbed, and then to the joy of saving lives at the end.
Sensitive subject matter, superb acting skills of male and female protagonists, the film can be described as a masterpiece that transmits positive energy.
The film makes everyone full of hope for "drug rehabilitation".
But behind such hope, the odds are really too small, and not all mothers can be like the heroine Holly to their sons, not abandoned! Don't give up! Don't fall!
The title of the film is "Ben Is Home", that "home" is the place where Ben who "took drugs" was "redeemed", whether it is emotional sustenance for the dog or the mother, it shows that there is love, and the child will be saved!
(The views expressed in this article are those of the author himself)