"Heirlooms"

20 February 2025

2 mins 48s

Hard to Bear.

Directed by Luke Brookner, 'Heirlooms' revolves around Bear (Harry Cadby), a troubled young man who does just enough to keep family, friends, and colleagues off the scent. It only gets harder when he becomes a dad, however, and it becomes clear that the words he speaks belong to a suicide note. It's hard to watch and hard to listen to, but then the voice... changes.

It sounds much older all of a sudden, and ends with the words "I love you, Bear." The pen belongs to a man who turns round just as Bear walks into the room, eager to tell dad that the youth team he coaches has just won the league. The old man means it when he says well done, but the look in his eyes confirms there's not much else to say at all.

They say time is a healer, but it's clear that Bear is still broken as he sits down with his teenage son. The advertised charity claims there's a one in three chance the former will have suicidal thoughts—if he goes through with it, where does that leave his boy? Stuck in that most vicious of cycles.

Suicide&Co's mission is to break it, of course, and a film fuelled by honesty and bravery (executive producer Will Castle's father took his own in 2010) is a good place to start.

UK

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