Review of American History X (1998) by Filipeneto — 11 Aug 2021

I really enjoyed this movie. Launched in 1998, it remains extremely current and relevant today, in the midst of a world where hatred and intolerance seem to have settled in to stay. I'm not just talking about the Nazis, but about so many others who hate each other for the most diverse and, not infrequently, the most idiotic reasons.

The film follows the path of two brothers in the neo-Nazi world: Derek, the eldest, became the leader of the local gang, formed to resist what they considered to be an invasion of their neighborhood by blacks, Latinos and other races. It turns out that he ended up killing, in cold blood, two blacks, and was arrested for it, leaving his younger brother Danny lost and confused. When he gets out of prison, he finds that his brother has followed in his footsteps and is now being indoctrinated to become just like him, even writing an essay laden with neo-Nazi doctrine for a black teacher at his school... but prison changes people, and Derek no longer follows those ideas. Therefore, he decides to collaborate with the teacher and the authorities, and try to prevent his brother from becoming a person as violent and harmful as he is.

Directed by Tony Kaye, the film was produced under the sign of discord, with constant fights in which the director opposed the revisions and changes demanded by the actors to their material and ideas. Things got to the point where the director wanted to give up, and see the name removed from the credits! Personally, and after seeing the film, I feel the direction is not safe and the film doesn't seem to know where to go at times. The script, in turn, brings us a powerful family drama and addresses tough, pertinent and current issues, such as the breakdown of the family, local neighborhood communities, illegal immigration, hatred between races and religions. The script even manages to avoid portraying neo-Nazis in a simplistic and one-dimensional way, as fanatical beasts without any humanity, as other films would have done. Even so, it is a simple narrative, sometimes undeveloped, in which some details sound far-fetched. One of the less developed and most important points of the film is the story of Derek in prison: it is inconceivable that such an indoctrinated and fanatical individual could radically change with so little.

The cast is very good and, without a doubt, one of the strengths of the film. Edward Norton proved to have made the right choice when he decided to star in this film instead of being just another actor in "Saving Private Ryan". The film is perfect for him, and the changes that he made to the material he received allowed him to improve the character, smooth the edges and make the fruit of his work even more mature and juicy. The actor is exceptionally good, I've said it on other occasions, and this film shows, once again, his talent. Next to him is Edward Furlong, a young and promising actor who, as we know, never took off. He's good, and he shows us that, even in a movie where the character is relatively minor in the plot. Stacy Keach appears little, but manages to appear menacing and subversive. Beverly D' Angelo is good, but she got a blank character and Avery Brooks limited herself to what she had to do and her character sounds, well, amorphous and uninteresting. Also noteworthy were the honorable appearances of Fairuza Balk (in yet another slightly eccentric character) and Ethan Suplee.

Technically, it's a film with many points of value in its favor, starting right away with a good filming and cinematography job. The use of black and white to differentiate all flashbacks worked perfectly, even though it sometimes makes the film too dark and seems to me to have been overused. The makeup work, particularly Norton, allows him to assume a younger, aggressive and physically tough face and attitude in the flashback scenes, making a good counterpoint to the portrait of maturity and awareness that the actor brings to us after his character leaves from prison. The sets were really well done, particularly Derek's room with all those Nazi props. The visual, special and sound effects work well and the soundtrack, signed by Anne Dudley, sounds good, although it is very similar to thousands of other movie soundtracks out there.