I was at (3) elite Prep Schools at the same time: 1958 -1965 beginning in 7th grade. There were Jewish kids at the schools and a few black kids. I don't buy all the discrimination whatsoever - there wasn't any.Funny, at one school I went to we recruited an ethnic Catholic kid and we were a Protestant School. That kid eventually played in the NFL. No problems at all.Another school I went to was the best football team in the state and the stars were mostly Jewish and no one thought anything of it.So, be careful when you watch what B.S. lines Hollywood wants to feed you. They mostly voted for Obama who has shown himself as a total racist 100% of the time after promising "healing". What a liar.

One in ten thousand films concerning discrimination against Jewish people that did not end tragically. Unfortunately it is also about one in ten thousand films of the sort that is not based directly on actual events. The question then becomes is it better to have an unlikely story that ends happily or a truthful one that ends tragically, it is up to the individual viewer to decide. Personally I love a great victory story, the oppressed gaining ground over the regime which oppresses it, no matter how unlikely. It presents a sobering message cloaked in the guise a coming of age story filled with the up and coming actors of the time, making it all the more accessible to various audiences and thereby spreading the message of equality further than other related films due to the seriousness of the subject matter. There were plenty of great zingers and the spot on acting of the main cast makes many scenes of the film memorable.

"School Ties", written by Dick Wolf and Darryl Ponicsan from Wolf's story, seems as if it must be a remake of something (possibly with Sal Mineo or James MacArthur in the lead). Athletic, handsome young man in the mid-1950s, the son of a blue-collar railroad worker in Pennsylvania, receives a scholarship to play football at prestigious boys' prep school in Boston. He's Jewish but keeps his religion under-wraps, and for good reason: the other lads swap anti-Semitic gossip in the locker room (right before the Senior Mixer!) and another boy confidentially tells our hero that one must go along with the curriculum if he wants to succeed. This is the kind of movie that might have been extended from a short; the first hour's set-up is practically irrelevant. The screenwriters lazily stack the deck against Brendan Fraser's well-meaning protagonist, even giving prejudiced-pal Matt Damon a reason to expose the Jew: he stole his girl! The '50s atmosphere is laid on thickly, what with an opening rumble between the ducktails and the bikers in an alley; we aren't even spared the proverbial prank on the snooty French teacher (who caused a student to have the same classroom breakdown that Natalie Wood suffered in "Splendor in the Grass"). It's a ridiculous picture, only notable now for the array of young talent in the cast. ** from ****

The opening shot establishes that the area is a coal, steel, and manufacturing area. Blue collar workers. Pennsylvania. This movie tells a story of a really fine high school quarterback who is convinced to attend an exclusive Massachusetts prep school for his senior year, as a way to gain entry into Harvard. Plus, the St Matthew alumni hope he will give them the firepower to beat their long-time rival.Brendan Fraser is the young quarterback, David Greene. But he has a secret, he is a Jew, and he is advised to "hold things close to the vest", don't reveal more than you need to. In that area, in the 1950s, anti-semitism was alive and going strong.The young quarterback proves to be everything on the football field that the coach wanted, and was a good performer in the classroom. But his secret was to eventually get out and that brings a new layer of drama to the story.A very young (19 or 20) Matt Damon is Charlie Dillon. Charlie has a number of issues. Being from the Dillon family much is expected. His brother is already a football star, and as last year's quarterback is being pushed out by David's recruitment. Add to that his long-time girlfriend takes a strong liking to David, and announces "I wish Charlie would quit saying I am his girl." And, if all that were not enough, Charlie is having a tough time accepting that he may just be ordinary. He craves the approval of his family.Other students are Chris O'Donnell, Cole Hauser, and Ben Affleck in relatively small roles. The girl is pretty Amy Locane, about 19 or 20, as Sally Wheeler.There is a line early after David arrives at the new school, "I guess you haven't had time to buy school ties". They wore a particular necktie, and maybe that is where the inspiration for the title "School Ties" came from. Even if it did, the story really is about the students and their ties to each other, even when bigotry is being addressed and a cheating scandal has to be dealt with.Good movie, good young actors.SPOILERS: David gets mean responses from many of the students, including Charlie, after it is found out he is a Jew. Then at finals Charlie cheats, he takes a crib sheet into class, and then loses it for the professor to find. David and another student see him. Before every test they sign an honor code, so this is a big deal. Being on a Friday, the professor tell the class, come up with the cheater or you ALL will fail this class. Just before David is to tell the others what happened, Charlie stands up and falsely points to David as the cheater. The whole class discuss it over the weekend, vote, and decide it is David. As he leaves the room he tells them "I'll uphold YOUR honor code, I'll go to the headmaster and lie." But when he does the next day, the other student was there too and set the record straight. As Charlie was driven away from school, expelled, he tells David "I'll still get into Harvard and 10 years from now no one will remember this. You will still be a dirty Jew." To which David responds, "And you will still be a prick." David stayed at the school to finish his preparation for Harvard.