01/18/10 - American History X

American History X (1998, 119 min)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120586/

I decided Martin Luther King, Jr. Day was a great day to check out this film I'd never seen before. For some reason I'd always equated this movie with the likes of Fight Club, Donnie Darko, and Requiem for a Dream. I guess these were "edgy" movies that my friends in high school were proclaiming as amazing and when I watch these while not in high school I've frequently been unimpressed.

The film stars Edward Norton as Derek Vineyard and Edward Furlong as Danny Vineyard, two brothers feeling similar angst at being white in their town. Playing their mother is Beverly D'Angelo as Doris Vineyard while schoolteacher Dr. Bob Sweeney (Avery Brooks) attempts to set both brothers on the right track.

Norton is a phenomenal actor in pretty much everything I've seen him in and this is no exception. Holding his own is Furlong (who will always be John Connor from Terminator 2: Judgment Day to me). The story weaves back and forth between these two and both are great. Though in pretty much all of Norton's scenes he's talking or doing something, that isn't the case for Furlong. But Furlong's brooding and thinking serve to flesh out his character in their own way. The other good performance here is that of Brooks as teacher. There's only a couple scenes that really feature the Sweeney character but he makes each of them memorable, especially the one discussion he has with Norton's character in the prison hospital.

Though I think this movie was liked by my high school friends for the one gruesome scene and the frequent display of swastikas, I really liked it for other reasons. First and foremost is how the story is actually told. Using black and white scenes to show the past is a cool touch. And while there's the obvious symbolism of using black and white for Derek's thoughts and actions in the past, the choice works for not just that reason. It really just comes off a nice way to split the past and present scenes without being too artsy or anything.

Another interesting touch was the voice overs done by Danny Vineyard. They gave a cool insight into the thoughts of his character that would not necessarily be seen in his actions or what he said. It also creates the illusion that he lived through the movie and was looking back on everything from some time in the future. The ending came all that more as a surprise to me. As for the ending, I thought it was really well done. It throws a wrench into everything the movie has worked to tear down with the Derek Vineyard character in the previous two hours. I guess the film is highlighting that even the issues of race aren't always black and white and that these complicated problems are just that - complicated.

The issues of race are presented in what I thought was a very good way in the film. Derek's character is pretty smart and voices his opinions in a smart way. What this does is that it forces the viewer to really think about the issues at hand by challenging previously held beliefs. The time when this is most apparent is during the one long dinner conversation between all the family members. It really produces some good points while also complicating the character relations that had existed up until that point.

I also really liked the Dr. Sweeney character. It's interesting how this black teacher could still be so important to Derek while in prison. Dr. Sweeney being intelligent but on the opposite side of Derek - both in race and in stance on race - further complicates the story. I similarly liked how the blacks in the prison successfully changed Derek's beliefs. While sometimes the film seemed to force feed how much the blacks were helping Derek, for the most part everything worked well together. Perhaps making the white supremacists that were also in prison a little more fleshed out would have helped though as they seemed too one dimensional in their beliefs. Having them more "real" would have helped make Derek's change of view seem more dramatic and poignant.

Overall, I gave this film an 8/10. American History X far surpassed my expectations (but they might have been too low to begin with). There were some problems with some of the characters in the film but it did a lot more right than it did wrong. I'm glad I did check this out.