director
Tony Kaye
screenwriter
David McKenna
producer
John Morrissey
cinematographer
Tony Kaye
music
Anne Dudley
editors
Jerry Greenberg
Alan Heim
Edward Norton
cast
Edward Norton (Derek Vinyard)
Edward Furlong (Danny Vinyard)
Beverly D'Angelo (Doris Vinyard)
Jennifer Lien (Davina Vinyard)
Ethan Suplee (Seth)
Fairuza Balk (Stacey)
Avery Brooks (Bob Sweeney)
Elliott Gould (Murray)
Stacy Keach (Cameron Alexander)
William Russ (Dennis Vinyard)
Guy Torry (Lamont)
mpaa rating: R
running
time: 119m
u.s.
release: 10/30/98
video
availability: VHS -
DVD
official
website
|
I'll
begin by praising Edward Norton, the only reason to see American
History X. Norton was magnetic in the lame Rounders;
now he's even better in a far worse movie. Here he effortlessly
slips into the tattooed skin of Derek Vinyard, a Venice Beach
kid whose fireman dad was killed in a crack-house blaze. Derek
pours his grief and rage into the cracked container of white
supremacy; it's only a matter of time before he cracks, too.
A brave and direct actor, Norton sells Derek's racist rants with
scary conviction. His intonations and rhythms suggest a bright
young man who's finally found a philosophy that makes sense to
him. He makes you feel what it might be like to be a confused
kid clinging to hatred.
For all his intelligence and skill, Norton can't save the movie
he's stuck in, but to be fair, I doubt anyone could. American
History X is trite rubbish -- an ABC Afterschool Special
pumped up with flashy, pretentious style and "gritty"
realism. Derek, who's just gotten out of jail (for killing two
black kids trying to steal his truck), has reformed and cast
off his skinhead ways. Problem: his kid brother Danny (Edward
Furlong), who idolizes Derek, has fallen in with skinheads himself.
Derek must redeem himself by rescuing Danny from his own former
madness.
The script, by David McKenna, is maddeningly sketchy. We're told
that all the skinheads revere Derek, that he and a white supremacist
(Stacy Keach) started the movement in Venice Beach. But though
the movie has many flashbacks, we never see how Derek built himself
up as a skinhead leader, or how he joined up with Keach. We don't
really believe in Derek's rage over his father's death, because
the one flashback featuring the two reveals little warmth between
them. We don't believe Derek's mother (Beverly D'Angelo) could
be such a dishrag that she'd let Danny keep Nazi decorations
in his room even after Derek has gone to prison. (The women in
this film are enablers, racist temptresses, or powerless whiners.)
Most of all, despite the best efforts of Norton and Furlong (who's
good), we don't believe their reformation. Danny isn't a character;
he's a blank kid who'll do whatever Derek does. The key event
for Derek, in prison, is when another skinhead rapes him -- it's
as if the movie is saying, "See, kids, this is what could
happen if you hang swastikas in your room." When Danny hears
the story, he seems changed, too. Forget brotherhood: the fear
of anal rape is the real answer to social ills.
For a while, American History X flirts with Clockwork
Orange territory. Derek visits his racist mentor and decks
him, which seems suicidal, considering the dozens of skinheads
partying in the next room. Isn't he afraid of reprisals against
his family? Amazingly, McKenna drops this thread completely,
but he wants an empty nihilistic ending, so we get a tragedy
utterly out of left field. Characters like Derek's rabid girlfriend
(an underused Fairuza Balk) fade in and out of the movie. Presiding
over it all is Avery Brooks, of the great stentorian voice, as
a wise double-Ph.D. teacher; this character, like the black convict
(Guy Torry) who befriends Derek in jail, seems to exist only
to deflect possible charges that the movie itself is racist.
Director Tony Kaye, who has made much noise about the film's
being taken away from him and recut, doesn't seem interested
in the inner workings of racists. His forte is grainy, banal
images familiar from TV ads (which is Kaye's background). The
only time he wakes us up is in the violent scenes, but any idiot
can make us wince at the ugliness of beatings and shootings.
With dialogue scenes, Kaye is hopeless -- he takes the camera
so close in that you could lose your hand inside the pores in
Edward Norton's left nostril. The thin skin of Kaye's style can't
cover the story's bare bones. American History X wants
to be a fire-breathing melodrama, but it just blows stale air
into your face. Edward Norton cuts through some of it. But a
powerful young actor can only do so much. |