Mr. Movie: Joe Bell fails to get to the heart of bullying kids

Jadin Bell and his family lived in La Grande, Oregon. It’s there Bell took his life at age 15. Bell made what turned out to be a fatal mistake of being openly gay. Bullies tortured the boy.

The movie — and fact-checking — say reports to school authorities about the bullying led to zero action.

One day in 2013, Jadin had enough and committed suicide.

His father, Joe, decided to walk across the United States to emphasize the need to address bullying in schools. Along the way Joe talked to crowds of high school kids as well as smaller groups of people.

“Joe Bell” is Bell’s story and Jadin’s story.

The movie stars Mark Wahlberg as Bell and newcomer, Reid Miller as Jadin. Four-time Primetime Emmy nominee, Connie Britton of TV’s Nashville fame stars as Bell’s common law wife and the boy’s mom.

Since the movie is about bullying, at this point I bring my own experience into the subject.

I was bulled as a kid. It often seemed like there was a big target painted on my forehead. Sometimes the attacks were a daily thing. Once in awhile there would — gratefully — be spaces in time where I was left alone.

Going places could be terrifying. I never knew when someone on a mission to be a jerk was going to step onto my path. For the life of me, I’ve never been able to figure out why I was a target.

Bullying ruined junior high and high school. I have friends who constantly reminisce about how much fun they had in those years. They remember them fondly. Lots of laughs. Good friends and good times, they say.

Not for me. And not for a lot of others.

Jadin Bell is in the “others” category. I never entertained the idea of ending my life. However, combine the bullying I experienced in school and outside of school with a father who was a bully and life as a child and then as a teenager pretty much sucked.

An asterisk here. My dad and I were able to address all of that when I reached adulthood and when he died in 2003, my father was my best friend.

I outgrew being physically bullied and moved into adulthood where bullying came from small-minded men who used their power as managers to bully. Again, it’s like a target has been painted on my forehead. So in my various career choices, adulthood kind of sucked in places, too.

Not totally but you get the picture. This brings us full circle to the movie.

The positive is Miller’s performance and the chemistry he has with Wahlberg. His is some of the best acting I’ve seen by anyone all year. Miller taps into the pain Jadin must have felt prior to taking his life and how — even with his father — he didn’t seem to fit anywhere.

The negatives — unfortunately — outweigh Miller’s excellent acting and how well he worked with Wahlberg. The problem likes with Reinaldo Marcus Green (2018’s “Monsters and Men”) and the two writers, Diana Ossana and Larry McMurtry (“Brokeback Mountain”).

Green and the writers paint Bell as a man who can’t seem to decide exactly why he’s doing a cross-country walk. Wahlberg plays Bell as conflicted about what happened to his son, his lack of positive reinforcement for the boy’s dilemma and an inability to really understand or sympathize.

The movie ends up just as confusing. Green, and the two excellent writers, can’t seem to decide whether the movie is about Bell’s cross-country walk or the boy’s bullying. It detracts from the message.

I can’t decide if they threw too much at the screen, or not enough. It’s hard to tell. The story is all over the place and the movie — for lack of a better description — lacks focus.

That brings me back to why I mentioned the bullying I experienced as a kid, and as an adult. Green, Ossana and McMurtry aren’t able to give you a sense of just how traumatic bullying can be to a sensitive person.

Worse, how traumatic it can be to a kid who is more or less defenseless. Jadin’s story deserves more.

Rated R for language, mature themes and violence. It’s playing at the AMC Classic Kennewick 12

Rating: 2 1/2 out of 5

This story was originally published July 26, 2021 at 11:21 AM with the headline "Mr. Movie: Joe Bell fails to get to the heart of bullying kids."