![]() And as an added plus, these chocolates apparently produce renewed sexual passion, empowering feminine fortitude, and a touching reunion between the town’s crusty matriarch ( Judi Dench) and her twelve-year old grandson. So what’s it gonna be folks? 2,000 year-old Christianity or 2,000 year-old pagan bon bons? Well, considering the village’s Christianity has produced nothing but hypocrisy, battered wives, family discord and general oppression, the chocolates look pretty darn good. But soon, villagers partake of her delicious chocolates made with a 2,000 year-old Mayan recipe. Not hard to do in the 1950s in which the story takes place. The town Mayor, the Comte, sets out to discredit this vile temptress and her illegitimate daughter. It is the beginning of Lent, so setting up a Chocolate Shop is viewed as a clear affront to civility and an obvious temptation to the faithful’s Lenten fasts. ) and her out-of-wedlock daughter, Anouk, blow into town (literally blow, mind you) propelled by the North Wind, a symbol of change and freedom. In the story, Vianne, an itinerant chocolatier and single mom ( Juliette Binoche … Dr. Teachings that frankly “Chocolat” seeks to depict as oppressive and unenlightened. And occasionally, Grace is still manifested in the teachings of the Church. The only problem is-it is Grace, not tolerance or autonomy, which is the Good Guy. And that, my beloved, truly IS a bad guy. The sort of merciless sanctimony that nailed Him to the cross. The sort of religious bigotry that Jesus spoke out against. He’s the evil Religious Right, the holier-than-thou Moral Majority-he, my brethren, is YOU!īut before you strike “Chocolat” off your “To See” list, consider this-the religious morality in these sorts of movies is always off-center, legalistic and ruthlessly judgmental. He proofreads the priest’s sermons, rehabilitates the town wife-beater and organizes the community’s boycott against rampant immorality. Here, Comte de Reynaud played by Alfred Molina, is the mayor and moral center of the peaceful hamlet. ![]() Instead of a narrow-minded fundamentalist preacher who spews forth damnation upon the evils of dance, or a claustrophobic B&W world where Fathers still Know Best, or even a quaint backward time when abortions were illegal, “Chocolat” deals with a time where a pervasive Catholic Church threatens to choke the joie de vivre, out of a quiet French village. We saw it in the 80s with the movie “Footloose”, in the 90s with the film “ Pleasantville.” And most recently in director Lasse Hallström’s previous film, “ The Cider House Rules.” You know, that well-worn plot that flows so effortlessly from the pens of Hollywood writers and secular authors. “Chocolat” is a modern morality play where morality is the bad guy and tolerance is its brave heroine.
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