Life is more than black and white.

Rating: 10/10 (5 February 2011)

All is not well down by the beach. Local teenager and Venice Beach High School student Daniel Vinyard (Edward Furlong) is on the same slippery slope his older brother, Derek Vinyard (Edward Norton), was on. After their fire fighter father, Dennis (William Russ), was murdered while putting out a blaze at a known drug den, young Derek was molded and guided by Cameron Alexander (Stacie Keach), a local white supremacist. Derek became the charismatic leader of the local neo-Nazi gang, the DOC. Here he recruited the scared and disenfranchised white kids in the neighborhood who were tired of living in fear of the growing local minority dominate gangs. Now, Derek has just been released from prison after serving time for the murder of 2 black, local gang members, who were trying to steal his car. As an older, wiser Derek emerges from prison, has he been released in time to save his family from the wide reaching grip of violence and racial tensions created by his own rhetoric? Director Tony Kaye's use of color wasn't to just simply help the viewer understand scenes that take place in the present and scenes that happen in the past. The motive of color goes deeper, as the present day scenes of color show us how Derek now views the world, with all its color and diversity. This is a stark contrast from the Derek of the past, whose view was much narrower and he saw the world as simple as black and white. Also, the use of low-key lighting during the past and the racially charged scene shows the clouded views of hate that Derek and others have of their surrounding world. Racially charged films show how their characters justify their hate. Much like Clint Eastwood's film, Gran Torino, the main character, Walt, drew his hatred for minorities from his war experiences. In American History X, Derek's hate was driven, in most part, by the senseless murder of his father (Morrissey & Kaye, 1998). This racially charged film shows that the world we live in isn't as simple as black and white.