Julia Roberts and Lucas Hedges in Ben Is Back (LD Entertainment/Roadside Attractions)

 In an age where pop culture celebrates and exploits drug use as if it were a happening fad—see Vice Media, Broad City, and Tove Lo—Ben Is Back feels like a very welcoming and reassuring entry into the anti-drug awareness film genre. Not since Darren Aronofsky’s Requiem for a Dream (2000) has a movie so crudely exposed the dark consequences of illegal substance abuse.

The viewer becomes a part of a family’s ordeal, the unexpected return for Christmas Eve of a drug addicted teenage son, coming home from rehab. Ben Burns, played by an extraordinarily complex Lucas Hedges, just wants to go back living a normal small-town life and spend the holidays celebrating with his loved ones.

Once welcomed by his unconditionally loveable and very tough mother, Holly (Julia Roberts in a performance that acts as the pumping heart of the film), Ben will have to struggle with the aftermath of his drug addiction. It doesn’t help to have an extremely skeptical and paranoid family, led by Holly’s second husband, Neal (Courtney B. Vance in a great supporting role), who disapproves of Ben and his issues. Kathryn Newton also shines as Ivy, the sister.

One thing is for sure, the audience is in for a brutally realistic ride. The yearly American conversation of having to spend time with disagreeing relatives takes on a whole new meaning in this low-key drama. The limited budget and locations all add to the film’s tone.

For almost two hours, Roberts becomes every person’s mother who’s had to deal with a drug addicted child. Holly goes from fully supportive to devil’s advocate to a restless loving warrior in seconds. It speaks volumes of the star when, at this stage in her career, she’s willing to take a humble and very human role in an independent production. Hedges’s performance is also a revelation. During Ben’s panic attack for merely being close to stashed drugs, Hedges made me feel stressed-out, as though Ben was my problem.

What I mostly loved about the movie is that it takes no prisoners and presents realistic facts, and so many aspects of the drug universe are depicted. It plainly holds a mirror to the current state of many families, and it doesn’t leave anything to the imagination while doing a wonderful job of illustrating just why drugs ruin the addict and everything else in the user’s life. There’s always something going on: debts are never fully paid, relatives are in danger, and you’re always making new enemies. It’s a film that speaks to the times, like a harsher Less Than Zero (1987) for Generation Y.

In an ambiguous world, it’s still amazing to see a movie that shouts: make no mistake, drugs are bad! It’s an uncomfortable but powerful journey that is very well-informed and researched; the whole brilliant cast did their homework. They’re able to transmit the family’s pain perfectly. Even the title itself flirts with the anything goes atmosphere of the picture.

If Die Hard (1988) is considered by some to be a Christmas classic, why not add this movie to the dark Christmas catalogue?