| Director | John Roberts |
|---|---|
| Genre | drama film |
| Runtime | 94 min |
| Country | France, United Kingdom |
| Box office | $12,712 |
In Ireland in the 1960s, more precisely the centre of the bridge over the river that separates the Irish villages of Carrickdowse and Ballydowse, there is a white line that few young people dare cross. The boys of each village spend most of their time trying to upstage the other, whether over the sale of hospital raffle tickets, or something more important, such as deciding who is a "tosspot" and who is not, or, for that matter, defining "tosspot". This "War of the Buttons", in which the buttons from the enemies clothes are captured, has gone on as long as the youths can remember, and "to the death", though rarely does either group hurt more than its pride.
The leader of the Ballys is Fergus, the son of a pauper family and an unpromising student who lives in a trailer on the edge of Ballydowse with his mother and abusive stepfather. What Fergus lacks in education, he makes up for in leadership, and the youth of Ballydowse will follow him anywhere. The members of the Ballys include Marie, the narrator, who revisits her memories of what happened from her adult viewpoint. The leader of the Carricks is Jerome, the son of a wealthy family. He is nicknamed Geronimo after the Apache tribal chief.
The story explores how events escalate, gang class differences (the original and main incentive for their war), Fergus's troubles with his oppressive environment, conflicts that arise when the adults of the villages discover the feud, and conflicts within the Ballys. Their tactics to "win" the war, including a nude ambush of their enemies, are shown in great detail. After a series of battles, Fergus denounces Riley as a traitor to the cause before the final showdown which has the Ballys attacking an abandoned castle ruin defended by the Carricks. The Carricks lose, and, taken prisoner, Geronimo himself cuts off his buttons and gives them to Fergus. While the Ballys celebrate in their headquarters, Geronimo, driving Riley's father's tractor like a tank, levels the Bally clubhouse. This puts a bitter end to the War of the Buttons.
Finally fed up, the towns' adults, including Geronimo's father and Fergus' abusive stepfather, reclaim their children. Fergus runs off to the mountains, where Geronimo follows him in an unspoken gesture of solidarity. After being captured, the two boys are put in the church orphanage, where they put aside their differences and become best friends. Marie narrates the coda, expressing that she married one of the boys, and that the other became the couple's closest friend, but she does not reveal whom she chose to wed.