American History X (1998) 3 1/2 stars out of 4. Starring Edward Norton, Edward Furlong, Stacy Keach, Avery Brooks, Beverly D'Angelo and Elliott Gould. Directed by Tony Kaye.
American History X is a brutal, saddening story of hate and the bitter fruit it sows.
The movie is a powerful and disturbing drama about prejudice, its consequences and family.
And director Tony Kaye gets right in your face with his message. Much of the movie is shot in close-up, so you can look these people in the eyes.
The drama centers around two brothers, Derek (Edward Norton) and Danny (Edward Furlong). The story is narrated by Danny, who idolizes his older brother.
Derek, following the death of his firefighting father - who was shot while battling a blaze at a crack house - succumbs to a philosophy of hate and is transformed into a charismatic leader of a white power movement.
Derek is sent to prison for murder. There, he goes through a process of self-discovery, realizing that what he thought he knew and what he was taught by Cameron (Stacy Keach), the behind-the-scenes manipulator of the skinheads, is bogus.
Released from prison after three years, Derek arrives home and finds Danny starting to trod Derek's old path - hanging around with Cameron and the other skinhead losers.
Derek works to dissuade Danny from that life of hatred, trying to convince him of the lies and intolerance spewed by Cameron.
Danny, meanwhile, must rewrite a school paper for his history class because the one he wrote on Mein Kampf - at Cameron's urging - was rejected. The principal orders him to write about Derek, how he feels about him and the events leading to Derek's incarceration.
Through this process, and through talks with Derek, Danny slowly comes to realize the truth - that the venom spewed by Cameron and his ilk creates nothing but misery.
Kaye and screenwriter David McKenna spare no one as the sins of one brother are visited upon the other.
Many disturbing scenes, especially the trashing of a Korean-owned grocery story, will leave you breathless in their mindless violence.
Norton gives a powerful performance, his best since his stunning debut in Primal Fear. He shows Derek's intelligence, his charisma and his commitment, both to the cause to which he thought he believed and, after his release from prison, his resolve to extract his brother from the ill-fated path he followed.
Norton's performance is of Academy-Award caliber.
Furlong, best remembered as young John Conner from Terminator 2: Judgment Day, brings a sense of confusion mixed with adulation to his role as the impressionable younger brother.
With his skinhead haircut and slit-eyed glance, one can see the virus of hate planted in the boy begin to grow. When Danny is around Derek, his entire posture changes. He is more the young, adoring brother hanging on every word said by his older sibling.
There is a powerful moment when the brothers take down all the hate literature and Nazi paraphernalia hanging in their bedroom. No words are needed. Their actions say it all.
Later, Derek stares long and hard at the large, black swastika tattooed over his heart, with a look combining regret and shame. Again, without a word, Derek places his hand over his heart in order to obliterate the foul reminder of his past life.
Kaye has gathered a rather impressive cast. Keach, as Cameron, is, in Derek's words, "a chicken hawk," preying on young dissatisfied minds to convert to his cause, sending them out to do his dirty work while he stays in the shadows. Keach speaks in calm, low, soothing tones, pouring his ugly philosophy into the ears of boys such as Danny. He is a snake in human form.
Avery Brooks, as the school's principal and Derek's former teacher, is a rock of integrity, a man who wants to help the brothers regain their moral equilibrium.
Beverly D'Angelo and Elliott Gould are featured as the brothers' mother and her would-be suitor. Gould's Murray, a liberal Jewish teacher, is driven away by Derek's racist and anti-Semitic tirades.
Kaye refuses to allow a happy ending. Tragedy, built from hate and bigotry, strikes Derek's family, and the consequences of his earlier actions are brought home in the most brutal manner.
American History X is not a comfortable movie. It will make you squirm. It will shock and disgust you. But most of all it will sadden you. The movie is a fine treatise on hate, a movie that should not and cannot be ignored.
Bob Bloom is the film critic at the Journal and Courier in Lafayette, Ind. He can be reached by e-mail at bloom@journal-courier.com or at cbloom@iquest.net
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