Every year, Girl Scouts hit the streets during cookie season, selling their wares as a fundraiser for their troops and for the national organization. The rainbow of colored packages, usually lined up on a makeshift booth, signal this annual allure of butter and sugar that prompt customers to line up to buy a box—or, well, 10—of the creative confections. In this engaging, lighthearted feature, Alysa Nahmias follows four young women, ages 5 to 12, on their quests to be a top-selling “Cookie Queen.” Families get in on the fierce competitive action as the girls track their numbers, devise novel marketing strategies, and push themselves to best their peers. Besides bragging rights, sellers and their troops can earn prizes by meeting certain goals, and having to buy inventory up front is extra incentive to hit their targets. Energetic and joyful, earnest and heartfelt, Cookie Queens observes a yearly rite of passage that happens to anchor an $800 million business. ST

Q&A following screening