The dedicated teacher Mr. Ross was right about such statement? How far would he go to teach high school kids an important History lesson about the most horrendous crime of the 20th Century? Watch it and judge for yourself while being part of an interesting experiment about how dictatorships are made without people realizing their dangers.
The story is basically the same as "The Wave", German film released in 2008, both films were accounts of an real experiment that took place in California in 1967, but the approach of both movies have their own differences. In what they're equal? In their greatness and the message they give to us. History teacher Ben Ross (Bruce Davison) tells his students about the genocide of millions of people during the WW2 intriguing them while demonstrating facts of how things worked at the time. But he's asked an difficult question: "How come no one among the German citizens did nothing to stop the Nazists of such atrocity? Ross doesn't answer this question but instead takes his students to be involved in something that might take these interrogations marks off their heads: he starts an experiment where all in the classroom must follow, being an united group who uses the quote "Strength through discipline, strength through community, strength through action" as their motto. Here it starts "The Wave", an united and disciplined group about to change hearts and minds of their school, and who knows more they can do.
It's all fun and new, until they take this experiment too seriously. Ross pushes them too far, forgetting that waves always return to the same place, always dying on the shore. His project makes the students blind of things, they've become unaware of how dangerous this could be outside of school's doors. He finds some resistance from his wife and from some of his students, but people will listen to this minority? Will Ross prove a point with this project or he'll be seduced by the power in his hands and make more of it?
This special presentation in more of an educational film rather than a thriller like the German film; the ending was absolutely great for giving the lesson in the best possible way while the other film teached the lesson in the darkest possible way (great and exciting as well). Davison gives an extraordinary show in the main role; some of the kids are really good (the solitary Robert, played by Johnny Doran, was incredible), others not so much, near of a bad acting. But the lesson was effectively presented but by the teacher and by the movie: lousy and irresponsible dictatorships can reborn at any time. You only need downtrodden people in need of a rescuer, of preference a popular leader to follow; victims to be blamed for the lack of progress of the country who'll must exterminated later; and make sure people won't realize what they're doing is really terrible quoting that it will be good of the nation. When I hear that most of 60% of kids in school age don't know what the Holocaust was it makes me wonder why films like this are not well-known for them to really learn something (you can even find it at Google). We, as audience, must never forget this lesson. 10/10
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