Hometown
Salem, New Hampshire appears idyllic from the outside. Beautiful fall colors blanket the landscape, and the town resembles a picture-perfect snapshot of suburban bliss. But this façade masks a trauma that festers in plain sight. The searing documentary Hometown exposes the crippling effects of the opioid epidemic in this small town and others surrounding it.
A grieving mother speaks of her dead son's valiant efforts to overcome the disease of addiction. We learn about her boy's hopes and dreams, the setbacks that led to his downfall, and his mother's powerlessness to keep drugs from eating away at her son like a fatal virus.
A detective pulls over yet another drug offender in another segment of the film. He longs for a return to the environment in which he grew up. We meet another life-long resident who no longer walks the streets of his hometown surrounded by the comforts of the familiar; he now must contend with the pleas of desperate addicts longing for their next fix.
Like most small towns across America, Salem and nearby Lawrence, Massachusetts were built on the traditions of the generations that came before. The towns have suffered their share of challenges in the past. The heroin epidemic took hold in the 1980s when the textile mills closed up shop or moved away. Economic depression has doomed these towns to a similar fate today.
We see local police as they interact with the diseased. There's barely anyone the epidemic doesn't touch in town, and the police are empathetic to the lost souls who do battle with this insidious beast. Around 85% of the arrests they make each month are related to opiate abuse, and the epidemic is responsible for as many as 500 deaths a year. Many of these victims are young people who once embraced lives of vitality and promise. Prescription opiates are the new alcohol for rebellious and experimental teenagers. When money and resources are tight, habitual users often turn to the cheaper alternative of heroin.
Featuring a string of candid and raw testimonials, and accented by inventive multi-colored animations, Hometown is powerful and profound.
Directed by: Brandon Lavoie
Very sad and yet the way it was filmed and produced is 2nd a to none. My heart goes out to the parents of every drug addict. Hopefully there is a way to stop the madness.
My 26yr old niece just died of a heroin overdose that was full of fentanyl. Not ONE phone call from the police to ask us if we knew who sold it to her? Did we have any ideas where she got it ? Apparently no investigation at all
To the cops who are going after the users and violating citizens are only gonna make it worse!! But just like 99% of the country cops who are too lazy to really stop the problem or you would be taking down the dealers who you said yourself are there. But who am I right? Yes I am a recovering addict but I’m also a veteran who served my country honorable in Afghanistan.
I know this comment is late but you’re so right!!!
And thank you for your service.
There's no such place with "no crime." Residents may get a slap on the hand and a lecture but there was and is crime - everywhere - every time. Then the statement that "drugs were only in the city," is erroneous as well. It may be "bought" in the city but it's "used" in the suburbs and rural areas.
It's amazing how white communities participate in drugs and it's sad and awful and the people involved were good decent people. But guess what? In Black communities they're degenerate animals that weren't good and decent people and no one should feel sorry for them!
As far as I'm concerned, the way blacks have been terrorized in America thru slavery, Jim Crow, and continued racism they are the most patriotic people I know. Most whites who have been devastated by drugs lash-out, become nationalized, yell reverse discrimination and the like when suffering from the slightest trauma.
It's a wonder all blacks are not on drugs with the hate and abuse they've received for over 300 years!!!!!! Now we get all these white "snowflakes" whining but where were they when " others" had been going through suffering 1000 times worse!!!!!! Women, children and men!
I feel sorry for whites but I have no empathy for them at all. Now that their leader - a con artist (you would have thought they had enough of being conned) - Trump tells them "It's not your fault." It's the press; the legal/ illegal aliens; China; blacks; Muslims; women not knowing their place and finally, all their woes are because of the LBTG community.
of course they themselves aren't to blame for creating and accepting racism and its I'll effects because they "were" enjoying "That Great America," where they were earning $50,000 salaries with/without a high school education but black and other minorities were forced into welfare and into crime. And now nationalist whites want that " again! " Racism, xenophobia, nationalism and all! Just as long as they " gets" their money!
Still haven't learned that the way you treat and think about other people will eventually come back to haunt (or bless you if you show genuine regard for others) you. If you're in the military you know that's known as "blowback!"
Accepting personal responsibility is much better way to find fulfillment and joy in life than that of adopting a sour attitude of victimization and demanding others compensate you for it.
However having made my comment below I want to add that many parents and educators have let their children down by not teaching them the character traits to act differently than some of those kids in this video have. Money is everything no matter who gets hurt. No one worries that they might be screwing up some other brothers or sisters life by selling them drugs and getting them hooked. They pick this attitude up at home and school. Of that I'm sure because I saw it over and over. Even my parents. I didn't sell because I was a coward and afraid of prison and not because my parents had taught me it wasn't the right thing to be doing. The shame is on them.
I need to take opiates for constant pain. Now my doc has warned me I might not be able to take them because someone in power decided that they don't work for my condition. Even though I have found many scientific papers that show it does. So I may have to pay the big price because the doctors who were supposed to be healing us decided it was better to make a bunch of money getting in league with the Pharmaceutical companies so they could get rich over prescribing drugs. I don't expect anything less of humanity anymore. The Hippocratic oath has become the hypocrites oath.
Seeing a Doctor cab kill you..Go talk to them and do nothing ..research every then decide..