Review of La Haine (1995) by Kieran O — 01 Feb 2009

Tapping into that raw, angry energy that permeated the Gen X-ers of the 1990s as they began to grow up in a world of economic hardship, institutionalised racism and the ability to acquire drugs, guns and booze with no problem, Mathieu Kassovitz's potent, blazing youth movie could well have been made in any developed country circa 1995.

As with most artistic cinematic movements, the exploration of a young generation started in France, and then went on to bigger, bleaker and more chilling success in the form of Kids and Trainspotting. 'La Haine' takes the normal '24 hours' plot and updates it for the modern world; a day lasts as long as its protagonists want it to. The central group, aggressive, raw-edged Vinz, naive but loyal Said and calm but disillusioned Hubert, survive through a crucial aftermath of a huge public riot. All seems everyday until Vinz reveals he has found the gun one of the policeman lost the night before. With this new power comes a bigger confidence to take on new challenges, such as facing up to police, skinheads, coke-dealers and trying to get laid, but all goes awry in the most awkward of circumstances.

Almost no scene passes without a fiery confrontation, usually between the three. Cassel, Kounde and Taghmaoui all give convincing performances as the troubled trio, and their constant antics, some fun, some tragic, are all the more spiked and shattered to go through. Though the group's relationship threatens to deterioate, it never does, and one can see that in the most desperate poverty and inopportune circumstances at least it makes the young men bond as friends.

Kassovitz uses his camera to squeeze between the characters to push the audience to the fore of every incendiary event. It's there in the bathroom, in amongst the crowds, between the a man's forehead and the end of a loaded gun. It matches perfectly the visceral and hyperkinetic anger exhibited by all the characters, literally shaking with rage, lingering on the pale, drained faces of it's young adventurors.

The messages are clear but not signposted. Kassovitz doesn't lecture, he just observes and shows up the conditions and lives people have to go through. 13 years on and everything is still the same, in France, in Europe, in the entire developed world. These are people governments and public have given up on, and in the advent of increased hooliganism from an increasingly younger generation, such neglect and contempt has swifty and irreversibly come back to haunt us. In the wake of a more dystopian present, 'La Haine' shows us where we all, whatever age, went wrong first. And don't we deserve it.