The Chocolate War

On the scale of prep school movies, The Chocolate War falls somewhere between Lindsay Anderson's If… (three disaffected pupils take to the rooftops to gun down the other wretched souls at their British boarding school) and Peter Weir's Dead Poets Society (a lovely film that errs on the side of sentimentality). Adapted from a novel by Robert Cormier, director-screenwriter Keith Gordon's 1988 effort focuses on Jerry (Ilan Mitchell-Smith), a 15-year-old new kid at a Catholic boys school. Principal among Jerry's antagonists is Archie (Wally Ward), a loathsome creep and smug manipulator whose dour philosophy ranges from "people are two things: greedy and cruel" to the more pithy "life is shit." When Jerry refuses to take part in a fundraising effort spearheaded by the transparently wicked teacher-administrator Brother Leon (John Glover)—who demands that every student sell 50 boxes of chocolates at an exorbitant rate—Archie and others in a secret student society known as the Vigils take their revenge on Jerry by way of petty vandalism, harassing phone calls, and a beating. All of this is occasionally played for chuckles, if not outright laughs; after all, the idea that selling chocolates is "a crusade," as Leon calls it, is inherently absurd. But Gordon is also aiming for something a little darker, and it's to the film's credit—or perhaps its detriment—that we're never quite sure what. DVD extras include an interview with and audio commentary by Gordon. A strong optional purchase. (S. Graham)