He's convicted of murder and sent to prison for three years. Then Derek gets out of prison and tries to find a new direction for himself and Danny. Their father, a fireman, was shot and killed by black addicts while fighting a fire in a crack house in a black neighborhood. The scariest and most convincing scenes are the ones in which we see the skinheads bonding. They're led by Derek's brilliant speechmaking and fueled by drugs, beer, tattoos, heavy metal and the need all insecure people feel to belong to a movement greater than themselves.
Hostile tribalism is an epidemic here.
The film, written by David McKenna and directed by Tony Kaye, uses black and white to show the recent past, and color to show the 24-hour period after Derek is released from prison. But it never quite does. Its underlying structure is too apparent, and there are scenes where we sense the movie hurrying to touch its bases. One crucially underdeveloped area is Derek's prison experience. But there's a strange imbalance in the conversion process.