Product Description

Jerry did the one thing no one expected. He stood up for himself. The new boy at strict Catholic High School, Jerry Renault, is bullied into selling boxes of chocolates for the school's annual fund-raising event. The sadistic headmaster, Brother Leon, and 'The Vigils', a vicious gang of school thugs, make Jerry's life hell when he decides he won't be pushed around anymore.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #28706 in DVD
• Brand: TWENTIETH CENTURY FOX HOME ENT
• Released on: 2007-04-17
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
• Formats: AC-3, Color, Dolby, DVD, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: English, French
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: 1.00 pounds
• Running time: 104 minutes

Amazon.com
After acting in literary adaptations like Christine, Keith Gordon returned to the well for his directorial debut. His smart and stylish adaptation of Robert Cormier's controversial youth novel marks him as a natural. Based in a frequently overcast Pacific Northwest, Jerry Renault (Ilan Mitchell-Smith, Weird Science) enters a Catholic boys' school in the wake of his mother's passing. The freshman already has enough worries, but then Brother Leon (a ferocious John Glover) instructs each student to sell 50 boxes of chocolates during Trinity's annual fundraiser. Jerry refuses. Leon is taken aback, but then he finds that Jerry's refusal--his assignment--was handed down by Machiavellian upperclassman Archie (CSI's Wallace Langham, then known as Wally Ward), head of the Vigils. The secret society also instructs Jerry to recant, but he sticks to his guns. At first, a few kids congratulate him on his stand, but then Leon and Archie, threatened by the iconoclast, turn the school against him. The climactic showdown between Jerry and Archie deviates from the book, but retains its cynical spirit. As Gordon explains in his DVD interview, "They both threaten the system, and in the end, the system is a much bigger problem than any one individual." Like his mentor Brian DePalma, Gordon aims more for emotional than visual truth, which translates into dramatic lighting and fantasy sequences (which are, at first, more confusing than illuminating), but the performances remain grounded in reality. Interestingly, Mitchell-Smith, who never overplays his hand, abandoned acting in the 1990s--for teaching. --Kathleen C. Fennessy

Customer Reviews

this was (is) your life in high school.
I believe Keith Gordon of all people directed this film. You know, the kid from "Back to School", and "Christine."Based on young adult novel by Robert Cormier, who also wrote "I am the Cheese." <--Check out my review on that movie too.Anyway, Catholic student, Jerry Renualt stands up to authority, God I like him already, by refusing to sell chocolates for his school. This divides the school - now the Vigils, a secret society of schoolboys decide to make Renualt's life a living hell. John Glover as a Catholic school teacher is crazy, and funny in a sick way. There is also a messege here about crooked politics, and how sometimes it's just better off to "play the game". Beware! The ending of the film, is completely opposite than the ending of the book. Low-Budget, but still moving. Bet it brings back some high school memories.

Great Movie based on the Book.
This movie follows the book very closely. The ending is just a bit different, but it's the same overall theme as in the book. the main character Jerry Renualt attends a Catholic school, Were he deals with an upscale gang called the vigils, who run the show. The movie is almost a satire but not quite, it keeps its realism and stays believeable. Often Novals of this sort do not make very good movies but this is an exception.

A disturbingly realistic view of collusion in cruelty...
Archie Costello is one of the cruelist characters in the so-called "literature for young adults" genre. He is an accurately rendered, charismatic sadist who is brought to the screen convincingly by Wally Ward in this nearly-faithful adaptation of Robert Comier's fascinating study in the "collusion in cruelty" of supposedly good people. Robert Comier cuts no slack in his story...the bad guys win and the consequences are even worse in the sequel, Beyond the Chocolate War. The film (with its avenging angel ending), however, is neither sacchrine, nor as tidy as some viewers contend. True, Archie...anti-hero, to the max...gets his. But Jerry Renault, the would-be hero of the film (who gets hell beat out of him in the novel) does not escaped unscathed by the "Something Wicked" that has come the way of Trinity High School in the carnival guise of a fund raising candy sale. The Chocolate War is that...Archie knows how to punch the buttons of cowardice and fear. The film...like the book...is unpleasant, but engaging because of the truths it posits about human nature. Ignore the bogus ending of the film and you'll be left with an ugly taste in your mouth which certainly isn't chocolate but might serve as the necessary medicine of reality. Recommended with caveats!!!