Don't Believe the Hype! Potentially great film pulls too many punches...

Rating: Null/10 (19 February 1999)

I did not find this movie "amazing, poignant and powerful" nor was it "entertaining or enjoyable." However, I did appreciate it for its thought-provoking subject matter. Alas, I think it misses the mark almost completely. The film addresses a legitimate problem that tragically exists in our world, yet it pulls several punches in trying to "teach" us any kind of lesson. From reading many of the comments here and elsewhere, the majority of audiences didn't appear to catch on to those lessons.
I found the ending not only disappointing in its predictability, but it virtually brings you back to the very beginning of the movie! Black on white crime was the issue that began the movie! Throughout the movie you are bombarded with black-on-white assaults as well as the reverse. We have the ownership scene for the ball courts, the high school bathroom scene and the market riot scene. And yet at the end you're left to think that the skinheads are coming for Ed Norton and Ed Furlong. I thought it would've been a far more absorbing way to end things going after "your own kind" and it would have made a far greater and stronger point.
If you allow yourself to hate one group or numerous groups, you'll eventually be consumed with that hate and lash out at even "your own kind." Look at the scene in which the Aryans in the prison turn on Derek when he decides to walk on his own. Granted, he walks away for the wrong reason, his open disgust at their dealings with Latinos. The rape scene is not only graphic in the most obvious sense, but it's graphic because it shows the conditional attitude towards "unconditional" love/loyalty/friendship, whether behind prison walls or on the outside. Remember how quickly Derek's girlfriend turns on him when she sees that he's got a new way of thinking? She hates him for "turning" on the only "family" she's apparently ever known. Where's her love for him (or her horniness for that matter)?
The real lesson here is NOT about how wrong it is to hate those unlike you. It's about hate, in any form. There is a pointlessness in hate that exists no where else, in no other emotion. Hatred and anger, while possibly legitimate feelings in a given situation, are base. These emotions do not allow you to think. They don't allow you to resolve or rectify the issue. Once you get past those emotions, only then can you attempt to make any change in a constructive manner. Remember Dr. Sweeney's comments when he visits Derek in prison?
Derek's laundry co-worker, Lamont and Dr. Sweeney are the only characters who set out to "actively" help Derek in some way one saves his life, the other his mind. Derek's sister and girlfriend are undefined. Davina is strong enough to stand up to her brother, going after him with a bat in one scene, but her passion is given limits. Stacy appears to be nothing more than a flaky stereotype of a young woman who can't think for herself. Derek's mother is a physical mess, incapable of helping anyone, even herself. She's paralyzed by the fear of watching a cycle of violence and hatred that is sucking her two boys into a black hole where the only logic existing is "blame someone else for your problems." And Head Racist Cameron is obviously only "helping" the boys to help himself.
The other regret I have about this movie is that due to certain graphic scenes, this movie will not be seen by younger generations who could learn a lesson, albeit a diluted one. I was somewhat relieved to see that there wasn't an attempt to have all loose ends resolved. This film does not attempt to answer questions, nor does attempt to say that everything in life ends happily. Life is hard and art imitates life.
The cinematography is not amateurish, but it's not original either. Ed Norton has great presence, before, during and after his "transformation." Ed Furlong truly stands out in a non-standout sort of way, a young man who is impressionable, adores his brother and yet has trouble speaking convincingly about his supposed hate (scene where Seth says "Tell me what I want to hear.")
The film's story line is one we've seen before (Mississippi Burning, A Time to Kill, Lords of Discipline, Lone Star, To Kill a Mockingbird, even West Side Story!) and will see again, done better AND worse. After all, we live in a country where at this VERY moment 3 White men are on trial for dragging/murdering a Black man from the back of a truck for 3 miles. And I regrettably live in a city that not only parodied that very tragedy in a parade but where 4 white officers recently shot 41 times and killed an immigrant from Guinea with no criminal record. This movie didn't reach me the way it seemingly reached others. Apparently seeing movies today ranks as news as opposed to reading newspapers or listening to news broadcasts.
In Mein Kampf., Hitler writes "By means of shrewd lies, unremittingly repeated, it is possible to make people believe that heaven is hell -- and hell heaven. The greater the lie, the more readily it will be believed."
Open your eyes America "the truth is out there" on our streets stop sitting complacently in dark movie theatres being spoon-fed "news," making studios rich. Go out into your communities and make a difference! Don't let White children be brainwashed into thinking they're losing their "great legacy" to undesirables and don't let Black, Latin, Asian and minority children think that the "white devil" holds all the cards.
We must all be responsible for our own actions! This country was built on far greater notions than making scapegoats out of one group or another! And remember, we may all be different colors, but our blood is only one color.