THE CHOCOLATE CASE

In 2003 three Dutch watchdog journalists—Teun van de Keuken, Maurice Dekkers, and Roland Duong—found a scandal hiding in plain sight: published reports that the chocolate industry used child slaves as laborers on cocoa plantations. Their concern about this exploitation kicked off a decade-plus odyssey to produce a 100% slave-free chocolate bar. This arresting documentary shows how difficult their task was: the journalists faced chocolate industry indifference (if not outright hostility and stonewalling), judicial apathy, and plenty of misinformation. Even when the trio successfully market what they think is an ethically sourced bar (dubbed Tony’s Chocolonely), it only leads to more questions and troubling revelations. THE CHOCOLATE CASE pulls the curtain back on how the food we consume is actually made and illustrates the severity (and reality) of the industry’s human rights violations by airing harrowing interviews with former chocolate slaves. Viewers will likely never look at a candy bar in the same way again. (In English, Dutch, French, and German with subtitles) —A.Z.