Joe Bell’s march against bullying

Released in cinemas this summer in America and available for streaming online is the heart-wrenching true story of Joe Bell, a man from Oregon, USA who after the suicide of his son Jadin, decided to walk across America to bring awareness to the scourge of bullying and intolerance towards young gay people in schools. A problem that is rife in South African schools where LGBTQI teenagers are subject to terrible bullying both in the school and online.

The film which has had a mixed reception from critics who generally pan the script writers and whilst acknowledging the importance of the films message many feel it was lost opportunity. Despite this the film is important, for The real Jadin Bell

it is through main-steam media exposing the lives and issues many gay teenagers have to deal with on a daily basis that change can be made. The film makes us look not only at ourselves but at colleagues, fellow students and society’s attitude towards the torment and injustice of bullying.

“It’s a horrible thing to be surrounded by people who hate you when they don’t even know you, for a reason you can’t change. One they can’t comprehend or understand. This is the life I live. Some nights, I look for the pieces I’ve dropped along the way. On these nights, I cry myself to sleep and hope tomorrow is a better day. But it never is. Every year, I look forward to school starting again, but it never turns out the way I expect it to. I pretend not to notice the looks I’m given. Avoiding eye contact with every guy bigger than me. I’m surrounded by people who hate me. Who want me dead. I can’t keep talking myself out of it. I don’t know what I’m gonna to do if I don’t. It’s only getting worse. I just want it to be over. It will be soon

enough.” - excerpt from an essay by Jadin Bell discovered after his death

The film tells the true story of Jadin Bell, who was bullied mercilessly at school for being gay. He doesn’t face the warmest of treatment at home from his father Joe, either, who is unable to voice his acceptance of his son. When Jadin commits suicide, Joe sets out on a cross-country walk as part of an anti-bullying campaign.

Joe’s story made headlines back in 2013. He quit his job and helped launch Faces for Change, speaking in schools all across America. Unfortunately, even that part of the story ends in tragedy.

Directed by Reinaldo Marcus Green (Monsters and Men), and starring Mark Wahlberg, Reid Miller, John Murray, Connie Britton, Maxwell Jenkins, and Gary Sinise with Brokeback Mountain script writers Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana Joe Bell sends a powerful message through an emotion heart-breaking somewhat awkwardly written story.

This is possibly a vehicle for Wahlberg to make amends for certain indiscretions in his past back when he was young and the film is a good way for him to do it. Reid Miller is brilliant as the bullied son and Connie Britton is good in her role as his mother, but it is not the acting or Mark Wahlberg’s awkwardness and limited abilities as a public speaker that the film has its power. The films message is not diminished.

Some critics have criticised the film as being clichéd. If a message about the tragic suicide of a teenager is clichéd, or if Jadin Bell’s campness is clichéd or the drag queen in the bar is clichéd or the straight, sport-loving dad of Jadin is clichéd then so be it ... people are stereotypies - I’ve met enough drag queens to know that her portrayal was spot on. I’ve been a camp teenager who was bullied like Jadin, and I had a sport-loving father who didn’t get it, but I knew loved me.

This emotional film is about bullying, it is about the fact that some young people live a life of hell with no one to turn to. The lack of support, victimisation and the intolerance, lack of empathy and ignorance from fellow learners, teachers, parents and friends who for their own reasons won’t or don’t stand up against bullying until it is too late and another gay teenager has tragically been driven to take their life. Don’t let critics who think they could’ve done it better put you off - this is a good movie with a great message and it’s socially relevant.