While bills designed to deliver a blow to bullying have fallen flat on their face in the Ledge this year, a new documentary may resonate with residents in a different way.

That’s not to say the state has sat idle and let this hot topic in Hawaii boil over. But students I’ve mentored assure me it’s unfortunately still a serious threat to learning and living here.

Lee Hirsch’s “Bully” comes out Friday. I thought this line from the NYT’s review of the film nailed it: 

And while the film focuses on the specific struggles of five families in four states, it is also about — and part of — the emergence of a movement. It documents a shift in consciousness of the kind that occurs when isolated, oppressed individuals discover that they are not alone and begin the difficult work of altering intolerable conditions widely regarded as normal.