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Good concept, poorly executed.

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

Worth seeing just to witness how winsome it is.

I'm a fan of Keith Gordon. I've liked all his films which I've seen, which was all but 2, before this. I will say his direction wasn't bad at all on this film. Even the dialouge in his script isn't laughably bad. But this premise! Possibly the stupidest premise I have ever seen. I had no idea what the film was about but I didn't think "chocolate war" was literal. A bunch of high school boys selling chocolate? What would possess anyone to give him funding for such an atrocious idea? I had to laugh at some scenes. KG does a good job to set up drama with pacing, editing, cinematography and acting but then you realize what the drama is - some boxes of chocolates are missing. Oh my god!!!!! I peeked in on the commentary at a few spots and its funny I heard KG putting himself down. It was a first film and was pretentious as he admits. I think he is one of America's most underrated directors but I am glad he saw the light and began doing adaptations. I can't believe IMDb gives this a 6.7, should be a 1.5.p.s. yes, yes I "get" that the chocolate storyline is a vehicle for the deeper things the film is trying to say about class distinction, standing up to bullies, male comradary, blah, blah. The story sucks!edit: p.s. after posting I realized it IS an adaptation. The opening credits end with "written and directed by Keith Gordon" which is usually only done when it is an original screenplay (more young pretentiousness?). That may help explain the funding and gives KG a slight break but I still stand by what I say about the premise being ridiculous, no matter how the film compares to the book.

I loved The Chocolate War from the moment I picked it up. The book, I mean. As a writer, this bleak piece of work changed my perspective.Of course, when I discovered there was a movie, I jumped at the idea of viewing it.Now, the movie took me on a roller coaster. At first, I was disappointed with the outdated soundtrack, bizarre dream sequences and the like, but then, the moment Archie appeared, I was sucked in. This movie followed every little detail it could, and I found myself smiling and waiting for the brutal conclusion.--Spoiler-- Like the majority consensus, the ending rattled me.Now, let me first say the ending is moderate for someone who has not read the book. In the event the novel had never existed, the bittersweet note of the ending would have sufficed. Been a little iffy, but sufficed. However, taking that single 90 degree rotation, to having read and adored Cormier's novel, and all Hell breaks loose in my brain.Cormier's theme was trampled. That is, that sometimes cruelty does win and goodness does not always triumph. Even then, however, I would have remained a shred of sanity concerning that ending.Furthermore, however, was that Archie had to explode out of character. He had it worked out, Archie had it together. Archie doesn't like physical violence. Archie always has a plan. Even if he has to improvise. So, from this, Archie wouldn't have let such a situation ever happen to begin with.Then, Archie had to turn into a cardboard cut-out of a villain by breaking the rules and wailing on Jerry after one blow. It seemed to me that Gordon realized Archie was so much more likable than Jerry, that only turning Archie into a simp who broke rules would redeem Jerry. It all came off as plastic, though. Archie is a simp, he can't fight, but he's also so much a simp that he can't take one blow.This part of the movie negates everything Archie had come to be throughout he film, and novel.And then, he is demoted for losing his head.Now, if that weren't bad enough, it seems that Brother Leon and Janza were so *proud* of Jerry for beating the crap out of Archie. Excuse me, what happened to the cruel Brother Leon we saw with Bailey? Or Corone? Whwere did he go? I didn't know he hated Archie so much as to root for Jerry, who could have cost him his job and such, had ARCHIE not saved his ass.And Janza? Who beat the crap out of Jerry a half hour before (movie time)? Who was ready to beat up Jerry again? Why, pray tell, does he then cheer on Jerry? It was just dreck. It didn't make sense in the constructs of the movie itself, let alone Cormier's masterpiece.I gave it an 8/10 because I still enjoy watching the movie. I just turn it off after Archie draws that first marble.

I went into this film expecting yet another inspirational story about an individual triumphing over the oppressive system. Instead, this film is a lot deeper than that... and a lot darker. It is at once a film about the horror of conformity and the deadening pointlessness of resistence. Our young protagonist, Renault, still agonizing over the death of his mother, is given a right-of-passage style task by his school's secret society, run by the calculating and elagantly power-hungry Archie : To refuse to sell chocolates to boost school income for 10 days (an activity Brother Leon, the equally power-hungry John Glover, is pushing on the students with unexpected zeal). But when his ten days are up, he still refuses to bend to the will of a system that wants only to use him as a tool. Both Archie and Brother Leon then use every method in their power to keep this rebel without a cause from toppeling them from power.Simple enough, but this, as I said, is not a simple film about fighting the powers that be. The protagonist actually has little to say about his own action: he's so opaque that it seems even HE doesnt know exactly what he's rebelling against, just that he can't give up. He doesnt really know what he's doing, and as his life is made more and more awful by Archie and Brother Leon, it becomes increasingly clear he doesn't enjoy it either. He simply feels compelled to, and stoically refuses to give in, despite the obvious pointlessness of his rebellion and the cruel consequences that ensue. But this makes for a very hard hero to identify with and root for. In fact, most of the film revolves around Archie and his attempt to break Renault's will. Archie is very talkative, and in fact the camera seems oddly attracted to his mercilessness, elegance and charisma, even as we assume we're supposed to revile him. Even creepy John Glover plays his villain very straight, giving only a vague, intangible sense of menace. By creating a hero we can't understand and villians we gravitate towards, the film subtly creates a situation where we can't really take sides, and can only observe the pathetic hopelessness of both situations. After all, this is all about selling CHOCOLATES. This throws the entire proceedings into an almost absurdist light. Light touches of humor (including a brief but spot-on perfect cameo by "Harold and Maude"'s Bud Cort) reinforce this classification and keep the proceedings from ever becoming bogged down in their gloominess.All in all, though, The Chocolate War is a very dark, slightly surreal tale of the emptiness of life, for winners or losers. It suggests that, fight the system or succeed with it, you're still just a tool of larger forces, unflinchingly puppeteering smaller lives for their own banal ends. It offers no solutions and no salvations, not for anyone. Just hubris and humiliation, and perhaps a grim chuckle or two along the way. Its this demenor that makes it a truly overlooked and rather unique cinema gem, well - worth some time and thought.

An extremely low budget adaptation of Robert Cormier's coming-of-age novel hits most of the marks with accuracy. For the uninitiated, the plot concerns Jerry Renault, a freshman at a religious private school. He is drifting in an emotional vacuum since the death of his mother particularly due to the resulting emotional gulf between he and his father.At Jerry's school a secret society known as The Vigils plan various pranks and psychological games, known as assignments and given to various nervous freshmen such as Jerry. When a school chocolate sale becomes the focus of the Vigils and the staff, Jerry takes a seemingly futile stand against conformity that sets off many ramifications...The main things to praise about the adaptation are the acting by the various (mostly quite young) participants, and the tight script, which maintains a remarkable fidelity to the structure of Cormier's novel.MAJOR SPOILER!!!There has been much controversy concerning the ending to the movie, which is of the surface quite different from the novel. It is true that in the novel the villians go 'unpunished', while that is not the case in the movie. However, I would argue that the fate of Jerry, the protagonist is roughly the same. The point being that even if Jerry 'wins' the climactic fight, he has still really lost, because he has doomed himself by being a participant in a contest not of his making.Worth a look, but if you're studying the book at school, you'll need to read it as well.