Cast: Edward Norton, Edward Furlong, Beverly D’Angelo
Director: Tony Kaye
Screenplay: David McKenna

Synopsis: A former neo-Nazi skinhead tries to prevent his younger brother from going down the same wrong path that he did. [1].

Review:

“American History X” is an unsettling but introspective film from the perspective of a reforming former neo-Nazi. The film captures how young, impressionable people fall prey to the idealism from older, jaded people that actively seek out victims for their recruiting efforts of violence and bigotry. “American History X” walks us through the process from a young Derek Vinyard (Edward Norton) exposed to prejudice early on from his father. The conversations throughout the film actually bring up interesting points, especially the dinner scene, regarding race relations, instead of devolving into racist rants, we get a deeper insight into the psychology that fuels the hate in the first place.

The points explored in this film are the roots of what cause the hatred that would drive someone to become racist and act on their violent impulses. The foundation for racism stems from feelings of fear about their lives, that maybe there are certain types of people that attack them almost every day, and they feel powerless to retaliate for fear of losing their own lives at the expense of losing themselves as perpetual victims. This causes the individuals to seek out groups or organizations, a brotherhood, where they not only fit in, but can thrive and be offered protection. This empowers the former victim, and allows them to act out their anger fueled by the confirmation bias of their new found peers. This is also a foundation of cult behavior and is directly from the playbook of organizations that seek to radicalize a local poor population for their own agenda. In order to keep the people in these organizations in check, the leaders must constantly barrage their disciples with propaganda in order to secure their brain washing, as well as making sure their higher ups keep the others in check with peer pressure or even violence, not accepting any decent amongst the ranks. The other issue is that these organizations driven by such hatred in their ideology also strips the humanity away from them because in order to work within the confines of a larger organization you must sacrifice some of your individuality for the greater good. When you have a large organization that strips away your individualism, you become part of the collective acting without thought to your own actions, because in your brain washed state, they are not your actions, but the organizations. This is very similar to what happened to the lower ranks of guards and other positions in World War II Germany.

In summary, hate that forms prejudice, racism and acts of violence is not formed in humans from birth. Hate is a learned emotion from circumstance and those around us growing up. If hate is something that is learned, then every person that holds onto this hate also has the capacity to unlearn hate, as explored in this film with Derek forming a friendship with a black inmate. This film did not seek to exploit the neo-Nazi movement but explored what the world is like, and from that lens, we have the tools to help those that get caught up in the hate machine.

References:

  1. “American History X.” IMDb: The Internet Movie Database. IMDb.com-Amazon.com, 1990-2014. Thurs. 8 May 2014. < http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120586/ >.
  2. “American History X.” Rotten Tomatoes.com, 2014. Thurs. 8 May 2014. < http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/american_history_x/ >.
  3. “American History X.” Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., 2014. Thurs. 8 May 2014. < http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_History_X >.