losindiscretoscine In his debut, Nic Balthazar skillfully mixes different social topics: addiction to video games, autism and also school bullying. Even though its scenes are sometimes excessive, Ben X is both a visual and a psychological punch. The video game universe provides Ben with a perfect shelter in which he finds the strength to continue living in real life. Also, this addiction will help him to do some discoveries and encounters. The many connections established between reality and the game are relevant. At the end, the film leads to wonder where the limits between reality and fiction are and it also shows that a video game can have both negative and positive consequences in the real world. Nic Balthazar cleverly mixes these two universes in order to get a hyperrealist and moving result that portrays a merciless world that constantly reject those who are different. Full review on our blog Los Indiscretos : https://losindiscretos.org

davidbeland I am not a gamer at all, so when i first saw the intro; Ben (Greg Timmermans) logging in his RPG account, picking up some cloths and weapons while narrating with his troubled and stuttering voice i thought: "Oh man, this is gonna be lame and boring as hell". I couldn't be more wrong!If you don't know how a guy suffering the Asperger syndrome (a form of autism) feels, this is THE movie by excellence. The actors performances are simply flawless, even breathtaking, the scenario is absolutely brilliant and the story, heartbreaking! Scenes after scenes, layers after layers you discover the cartesian mind prison in which Ben is held, trying his best to look normal. But also the disquietude and pain his family have to bear; some bullying scenes are quite painful to watch. If you've notice how teenagers can be cruel to each others, specially with those who don't fit the mold, then you won't have troubles believing that this story is based on real events. It's a very humane approach of a complex and misunderstood mental illness with a lot of depth. It's also a reflection on bullying vs "sin of omission" in a way. This movie should have way more exposure.

two-rivers "Ben X" is a word pun in Belgian Dutch and could also be read as "ben niks", which means "I am nothing" in English. In fact, Ben, the teenage protagonist of Nic Baltazar's first feature film, has lost contact to the world that surrounds him and does not want to play any role in it. He lacks communication skills, and does not seem to be bothered by that. The sad result is that he is bullied by his classmates in the most atrocious ways, a treatment that he does not even try to resist.On the other hand there is Scarlite, a beautiful girl, that seems to be in a way connected to Ben. When two of his classmates, Desmet and Bogaert, have taken his mobile phone away from him during another bully attack, they find a picture of Scarlite and a message telling him that she is going to meet him the next day at the train station. They are full of surprise: how could a guy that does not speak to anyone have such a lovely girlfriend? The answer is that Ben has created a parallel world of his own, playing online games. In cyber space he has met a girl who uses the name of "Scarlite", and who has become a collaborator in his adventures and even a kind of confidant or friend who intuitively guesses what is behind his plan to play the so-called "endgame": he is planning to commit suicide, and almost instantaneously she volunteers to be his "healer".But the meeting in the real world turns out to take shape in the only way that seems to be possible for a guy that is suffering from the Asperger syndrome: Although Ben sees Scarlite at the train station, he is unable to communicate with her. It is as if suddenly a barrier has appeared which he cannot penetrate. The girl finally walks away, but Ben forces himself to follow her and steps into the train that she takes and even manages to sit down next to her. Then, noting that he is in some sort of pain, she simply asks him if he is fine. Ben again cannot respond in a way a non-autistic person would do, and he hurriedly escapes from the train and loses track of Scarlite.Is this the end? In the next scene Ben is seen on a platform ready to jump. But when a train arrives and he is about to carry out his plan, he is miraculously saved by Scarlite who pulls him back. As it later becomes clear, this second appearance of Scarlite, in which she proves to be the "healer", preventing him from suicide, is no more than a construction of his imagination: Scarlite is present throughout most parts of the remaining footage, but she is never seen interacting with members of the real world, for instance Ben's parents, and in the final scene she virtually disappears, after seemingly having had a conversation with Ben the moment before.It therefore seems as if Ben is sitting alone and talking to himself. Strange situation, but thinking about it well, this must be taken as the only possible solution for his life. As it is difficult to establish a well-working human relationship for most autistic people, the salvation could lie in the imaginative forces of the mind.We might even call it love. Although the idea that autists are able to develop such a feeling must be new even to experts, the facts of the film are quite clear: Ben has become attached to Scarlite - or the idea of Scarlite - and after she saved him from suicide, he accepted her as a kind of personal healer. He has failed to approach her using the patterns of social behavior that a non-autistic person would use, but nonetheless nothing is lost. Using the forces of imagination, from that moment onwards Scarlite will be a part of his life. He will not stop loving her, and this imagined relationship might even prove to be more stable than a real one.

falquizo Movies about characters with disabilities usually focus on how the personal deficiencies were overcome, with everyone, especially the audience, feeling good in the end. This is not that kind of movie. Ben, the central character, is an autistic high school student subjected to repeated excruciating torments by his classmates. Everyday in school he gets slapped and pushed around while he cowers helplessly. Later he is subjected to a most traumatic assault by two of the meaner classmates, one cruel asault shown in the internet as a crowd of students cheer and jeer. Ben's divorced parents and the school authorities seem as helpless as Ben. As this goes on without respite I felt that Director Balthazar, (who wrote and directed this from his own novel), enjoyed Ben's suffering as much as his sadistic classmates. Somewhere along the movie I became convinced that Balthazar is submitting his own entry into the Torture Film Genre (Michael Haneke's "Funny Games" ('97), Mel Gibson's "The Passion of Christ"). Ben's consolation is playing his sword-and-sandal superhero video game, Archlord. This is used to tease the audience that at a certain point Ben will emulate his hero and fight back. He can never get himself to do it however. The only thing in that video game fantasy that becomes his salvation is the appearance of a young woman, Scarlite, who gives him the courage to act on his solution -- to die. It is this act that Balthazar uses to end the movie supposedly to shame Ben's tormentors and all the school authorities, into remorse over everything done to Ben. This retaliation that Balthazar cooked up, that these young brutes and thugs, these indifferent, uncaring and indifferent adults, can supposedly be shamed, I find not only naive but phony, artistically inane and dishonest. After showing us throughout the movie a group of irreparably thuggish youths and indifferent uncaring adults, Balthazar wants us to think that these people can be shamed into remorse and reforming. Balthazar's whole point seems to be that the only refuge the emotionally and mentally handicap can find is in the fantasy of video games, that the real world will always be cruel, even to the point of turning video -- the only world he can escape to -- into yet another torment. Balthazar probably forgot that the film world is bursting to its seams with Christ metaphors and Christ themes have long been exhausted, and any new attempt is artificial and shallow. Timmermans' performance, even if he looks older to be a high school student, is highly commendable. Ben's absorbing fear of the world outside his room and his video screen is perfectly encapsulated in the way he coils unto himself, the way he walks as though anticipating to fall or sink as he takes his next step, the contortions on his face as he walks through the gauntlet of students. The repeated shots from above when Ben gets out of his house looking like a creature coming out of a hole in the ground is a haunting image, implying his being not of this world. This is a well-photographed movie with a good script, very well acted by all, especially Timmermans and Verlinden, but the treatment of a disabled life really stinks.Tito Alquizola ##