The Boys Next Door

In a communal residence in a New England city, four mentally handicapped men live under the supervision of an earnest, but increasingly “burned out” young social worker named Jack. Norman, who works in a doughnut shop and is unable to resist the lure of the sweet pastries, takes great pride in the huge bundle of keys which dangles from his waist; Lucien P. Smith has the mind of a 5-year-old, but imagines that he is able to read and comprehend the weighty books he lugs about; Arnold is the hyperactive ringleader and compulsive chatterer, while Barry, a brilliant schizophrenic who fantasizes that he is a golf pro. Where “little things” sometimes become momentous and often very funny, are moments of great poignancy when we are reminded with touching effectiveness that the handicapped, like the rest of us, want only to love and laugh and find some meaning and purpose in the brief time which they, like us, are allotted on this earth.