FIRST TIME WATCHING: American History X (1998) REACTION (Movie Commentary) REUPLOAD 

Considering how controversial this was, it's a wonder he even got a nomination. Normally, I wouldn't expect the Academy to touch a movie like this with a 10 foot pole.

Absolutely

Awards mean absolutely nothing.

Yup!

Yep!

Agreed

Have you seen “The 25th hour?” Amazing movie with Edward Norton.

@@mzliz1249 will have to check this one out thanks.

@@mzliz1249 one of my top 3 for Edward Norton !!!

Death to smoochy!

Yeah finally showed the other side that’s what I liked

truth. sometimes you have to show the ugly side of things to make ppl realize how bad it is.

Some of it is hard to watch whether you are black or white but a great movie with great acting and just shows how racism is bullshit. We are all the HUMAN RACE. We all bleed the same color and all need the same things. Food, clothing, shelter and most important of all - Love and respect for fellow human beings trying to survive on this planet. Some people are born and raised into a certain ways of thinking and don't know any better... Sad ending. I feel blessed to have grown up and went to school with people from all races and cultures in Canada. Many friends from different backgrounds/upbringings and cultures. I was the one that stuck out like a sore thumb, even as a young adult. The only "white boy" at the party (Even though I'm a crazy mixture lol) in bars and clubs packed shoulder to shoulder with black people/brown people/Jamaican/Caribbean/Dominican/African/Australian/Inuit/Native North American/Native South American/Cambodian/Philipino/ Chinese/Japanese/Korean/Russian/Ukrainian/Polish/Irish/Scottish etc, etc and all kinds of mixtures of everything in between all my life and from all different denominations of religion's ❤️

If you're black and no longer the bully it must suck

yeah, I showed this movie to my parents and as uncomfortable as it was by the time the movie ended they both expressed how powerful this movie was. It's like the most appropriate, inappropriate movie because in the end it has a good message.

Exactly, that is what most people failed to see.

so does Derek go back to hating black people now?

Moral of the story: Never relax. Danny let go of the hate, and as a result let his guard down.

You saw glimpses of an older mentor directing the young shooters anger into hateful action.

Derek didn’t kill some random innocent kid though 🤔

Absolutely!!! When you give it up you become super happy bc it feels like a huge weight is no longer weighing you down. I'm so happy people prolly think I'm fake, but if they knew me before they would know it's authentic.

Bababooey

Ooo edgy

Hate is a mental disease like addiction and obesity !

Such an amazing line

Right. It was about the cycle of hate. White on black, black on white. It doesn't matter, hate destroys all.

@@shaquanjamison8161 Except Black on white is 10x more. Black on Asian is crime is more, Black on Hispanic crime is more. Once the political climate changes this needs to be addressed.

The cycle continues😥

No you assume

​@@PentaRausAn uncomfortable truth

I'm probably an inch shorter than Norton, and I could dunk. HOWEVER, reverse dunk... I'm not buying that.

Honestly, some times I think Edward wasn´t acting in this movie 😬

@@birch5757 In a game? I was a 6 foot 2 white guy and I could barely dunk on 9 and 1/2 foot rim with noone around.

@@Mark-fr7yv I did it literally one time in a pick up game. It's worth mentioning I ran track and my 2 best events were the 400 and the long jump, so there was a window there when I could really get up.

I think he did play ball for real back in high school.

Second this. Iconic stuff.

Absolutely 💯

True

Oh by miles today

I was just talking to my wife about how good the 90s music is

And if you think back to when "derek" played basketball with black guys without realizing the potential camaraderie and missed friendships... he didn't learn then. he had to go through actual HELL until he realized that he was wrong and his whole world view was wrong. Amazing movie!

@@DurdenTyler21 why the quotations? Derek is his name lol

@@sevengramrocks2746It’s what you do when it’s a character’s name. Don’t blame me. That’s the English language. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

@@wallismeza8282yed that part spoke volumes

@@brianpearson7345I was just answering the question. God forbid, people should be educated. If people were educated, we wouldn’t have such people. Now that speaks volumes.

watch shindler list

He got snubbed like the lady who played the mom in requiem for a dream. Hollywood rarely awards anything worth the awards anymore lol

This movie holds no punches, its incredible!

This movie is just j00ish p0rn. A white supremacist getting buttgraped in the prison showers. And then he completely abandons his way of thinking just because a bleep says hello to him. Ridiculous. A much better film when you turn it off halfway through.

​@@andreprefontaine3824great piece of fiction I agree.

Yeah, the director's reaction was wild. His whole message seemed to be that people don't change, either can't and won't, which I think is damn foolish. People change all the time, and people can make dramatic changes, especially when going through trauma. Comparing the original script to what we got, I think Norton saved this film. It's arguably his finest work.

You articulated this so much better than I did. The ending was perfect. It showed someone changing but also the consequences of their actions.

Bingo, and perfectly articulated. The film turned out to be a nice classical tragedy-Derek changes his mindset in large part because, like Danny, he realizes hatred is just needless baggage, and he wants to protect his family, and especially Danny, from the consequences. But by the time he's able to get Danny's head right, it's already too late, and because of Derek's skinhead influence his greatest fear has already been set in motion. It's a form of storytelling that's worked for thousands of years across radically different cultures. Tony Kaye's original ending, by contrast, would have been *_repulsively_* cynical. He wrote an interesting article for The Guardian called "Losing It" about the film, and it's very interesting for a number of reasons, not the least of which is that even Kaye still has no idea what his original vision was: _"Whenever I argued with Norton, I didn't have a leg to stand on. He could wipe the floor with me because he's a great articulator. My problem all through American History X was that I could never tell anyone what I wanted to do with the film. Sometimes I didn't even know myself. More often, I was so intimidated by the process that I went into meltdown if I wasn't left alone to work things out. Of course, if you actually listened to what Norton was saying, you could hear that none of it made sense in film-making terms: that's not his forte, as you'll know if you saw the movie that he directed, Keeping the Faith. 'Pretty fucking awful' hardly covers that one."_ It's pretty ballsy of him to accuse Norton's cut of "not making sense" in the same paragraph he admits he didn't know what he was trying to say with his own ending, and that he couldn't counter Norton's logic. Never mind the fact that, again, the tragedy form has worked for thousands of years, and Kaye doesn't explain what about the film doesn't make sense. He just says it as if it's a given, obvious to everyone. You get the idea that Kaye isn't being intentionally dishonest, just a bit deluded. A talented but strange man, certainly.

@@je7055 agreed.. Kaye wanted to cut the flashback scene of Norton and his father at the dinner table... IMO the most crucial scene of the whole film I think Kaye did a great job directing it but I don't think he had a clear vision of what this film was trying to say, as he admits. It's a shame how he went to war with Norton over it and destroyed his career. I just can't understand what he wanted, as you say his cut was so oppressive cynical, if you really have that view of the subject then what's the point in even making a film about it? It's pure nihilism. I will say to his credit in later interviews Kaye has said he was caught up in his own ego as a creative and he was in the wrong

That's nonsense, do you have any idea how insignificant so called White supremacy is ? It's not even a blip on the radar compared to others

They scrubbed that scene everywhere. That's why you don't see anybody react to it specifically.

absolutely the same feeling

@@omilettwhat are you saying? Scrubbed I’m confused that’s all about it’s meaning

@@MikeLewis1964 Scrubbed = deleted / removed.

That scared you? Why? Its not a ghost.

That is a life turning question when in the throes of that hate and depression. It's a stunner.

Misstep could have ended careers?

You got a remember when this movie was made it’s not like it is now with all this cancel anybody who does something you don’t like

@@ryanssten731 yeah, I remember.. that's partially why I asked, because back then we didn't have to walk quite as much on eggshells. i miss those days when art was more honest

This was back in the day when we had the freedom to make the art we thought was important. Not today.

Don't forget how absolutely easily learned it is compared to genuine empathy. Hate takes a comment from a parent, love takes a lifetime of stepping outside of yourself.

Not all the time. It's also learned through experience and observation.

"Hate is not inherent. It is taught." Except it's taught through life experiences a lot more than someone telling you so and I'm pretty sure you were trying to say it was the latter.

@@jongordon7914 agreed. But, when you are young, and lack life experience, you tend to draw from what you are told.

@@Mr.Schitzengigglez Unfortunately, people often mistake fact-based caution, for hatred. A girl being told to be cautious around men or groups of men, is not based on hate but statistical probabilities. The same could be said for White people being told to be cautious around Black people, as Black people are about 9X more likely to commit a violent crime against White people than White people are to commit against Black people. It's not hatred, just self-preservation.

@@jongordon7914 my situation was, that I grew up in a black neighborhood, as a young white child, with a family who had espoused some serious racist undertones. I saw a lot of hate, and love,from both sides. I was left in the middle, to sort it all out. At this point, it's all bullshit. Just love your neighbor. They probably cook some bomb ass food. Which, is about the greatest thing in this life

@@Mr.Schitzengigglez And my situation was that I grew up in an almost entirely White neighborhood, went to almost entirely White schools, went to mixed schools and also got bussed to entirely Black schools, and saw just how violent and racially intolerant Black people were towards every race, ethnicity and foreigner. The extent of White racism consisted of jokes, slurs and avoiding Black people and feeling a sense of guilt for being that way. The extent of Black racism consisted of ganging up on White and Asian kids and robbing them or violently assaulting them and not feeling a single ounce of guilt or remorse. This movie, and reactions to it, is a PERFECT microcosm of racism in the 21st century. Almost all of the violence and racism in this movie was committed by Black people, from beginning to end and yet the comments are always filled with apologetic White people and angry Black people, condemning the miniscule amount of White racism and completely ignoring the Black racism. The Black Racism/Violence: In the beginning the Black racists throw a White kid to the bathroom floor, kick him in the stomach, and then offer him a hand to get up and kick him in the stomach again. At that moment, Edward Furlong's character (Danny) comes out of the bathroom and is just standing there when Little Henry approaches him and racially threatens him. Danny never says a word to them. Then at the Basketball game, there are Black and White guys playing on each other's team, but the Black guy is the only one to throw out any racial slurs. The White guys use racial slurs in private. After the Black guys lost the game, they go to Derek's family' house in the middle of the night and rob his family at gunpoint and try to steal Derek's father's truck. Derek's dead firefighting father that was killed while putting out a fire in a Black neighborhood. Little Henry is seen throughout the movie stalking Danny and ultimately murders him at the end. The White Racism/Violence: The violent attack of the immigrants at the grocery store and the rampant vandalism of the store.

I was 8, and watched with 12. This black and white thing must end

@TheDrJotta until we stop seeing people for their color and not their character it will never end.

@@nateworthy530 So much harder with the way people think of it these days. I was told not seeing skin colour was racist. Where I always treat people based on WHO they are, not what colour they are.

Just watched it and was watching clips of it on shorts and saw hundreds of people talking about how Derek was actually right being a white supremacist the whole time and his brother getting shit at the end proves it. They misunderstood the message. Now I’m disturbed

Well, being not racist got them killed, so yeah.

Nope... But it made me extremely fearce and dangerous. Carved me into a natural born leader. A King amoungst kings😤

I hit the same reality in my life once. That's where it all changed for him.

Thats the question bad people fear

I misquoted that line

That coupled with the scene when they are young boys gets me every time

They almost cut that scene out of the movie to have Danny die off screen and Derrek going back to his gang. Thank god they didnt

I wouldn't recommend this for anyone under 12 or 13, it has alot of adult themes and extreme violence. Just saying!

@@chrisfreimiller4878 I’m assuming you mean the one where Norton is by himself at home? Lol

@@williamswiniuch7527 the prison shower scene

Yep. Súper intense

Completely

It is the single reason that I've never actually wathed the entire movie, even though it came out in my teens.

I audibly gasped and flinched incredibly hard. i’ll never forget it

It's perfect.

Titanic came out in the same year it did. OOF

They didn’t want to condone violence I’m sure that was the reason. Yet look at what they condone now. Disgusting and pathetic.

Roberto Bengini for some crappy movie won. It was the 1999 Oscars and Norton was nominated along with Nolte for Affliction, Hanks for Saving Private Ryan, and some other dude.

1999 Oscars for 1998 movies

@@stewartcedres3893 Dang. Norton AND Hanks were robbed!

Probably not a great idea since it implies he may descend back into the world of hatred which is why they changed the ending.

Too bad in some states (I won't name them, but I'm sure you can figure it out) they'd probably ban it from being shown because it might hurt white kids' feelings or whatever bologna excuse they use now.

@@yulewave1 but that's what matters, is that they changed the ending to a better ending. Sad, but hopeful.

We actually saw it in school.

It should be..but to many people would be instantly " triggered" before even allowing the message of the film to get across..

I watched this with my own 2 sons as well as the movie Mississippi Burning. I wanted them to fully understand how racism and ideas like this are so wrong and how your peers can lead you down the wrong path. It was a powerful lesson for my kids to learn and now that they are adults I know it impacted them significantly. Parents need to have these difficult conversations with their children.

@@michellejames9969 well i was hateful as fuck 2 years ago from i was 13-15 I'm 35 now my becoming wife learn me to not be that hateful cuz she brought the light in my life and open up my heart to think more about not hat it take so much energy and i watch this movie when i was younger i didn't feel nothing i loved the boots scene stamp on the head well i guess i was to hateful back then but yes everyone can change i guess in time

@@Luciferhell5 I think it’s so honorable that your credit your wife so lovingly that she has brought light into your life and showed you some compassion. She truly loves you and you for her to have this impact. Everyone responds to movies in a different way, I watched it with my own sons explaining the movie to them so they would understand. It may have impacted you differently as a teen if you had someone who was watching it with you in the compassionate manner of your wife. But I believe everything happens for a reason and you two together, she has brought a balance into your life you may not have had. Either way, it’s still an impactful important movie that should be watched and hopefully understood in the lessons it tries to teach. 🥰

@@michellejames9969 yes i agree with you and thank you so much well she really made me to a better human and yes this movie is really important it have everything you need to know about hate love family and death and we'll yes of course all movie has different impact on people like some get scared by horror movies and some cry to sad things in movies and yes my wife sould have alot more than credits by this words i have text here but there is nothing in this world that is that much worth for how happy and grateful i am by she get that deep inside of my heart and make me really see how stupid and worthless hate is in life ☺️

@@michellejames9969 It's only a proper lesson if you made them aware of all the overt Black racism in this movie as well. But I imagine if you were murdered by Black people while trying to put out a fire in their neighborhood and Black people then tried to rob your wife and your kids in the middle of the night at gunpoint because your kids beat them in a basketball game, it wouldn't be unexpected that your kids would hold a bit of a grudge as they got older.

And so many would say Tom Hanks is the best ever. Norton always proves he is just as good or better. Personaly I will watch anything with Norton before any Forrest Gump.

lol Morphs into his roles he even became a hulk and a really good one at that

They would never make a movie like that today. They are going there absolute hardest to divide us today than back in the 90s

@@theyfearme1379 no cuz everyone is fucking to easy offend by put a fucking racist mark on everything but in the 90s you still cold joke about everything as now you can't and do what you wanted to as movie or not world become worse and worse

@@Luciferhell5 That's true too, but so is what I said

@@theyfearme1379 yes it is

It only feels that way because society has gone backwards in the last decade or so.

I love the nod to Kubrick

The most distracting part of that scene for me was Danny dropping the homework assignment when he falls, but is holding it when he dies.

Yeah what I got from this movie..... Doesn't matter if you have a change of heart this world is fucked up and never let your guard down. Doesn't matter if you're nice. Others aren't!

@@TheDkb427 That's what you got from this movie?

to me that kind of ruins the whole movie... the black kid kills him in cold blood, for what? Cause he blew smoke in his face? Kind of reinforces the whole "this is why we hate blacks" message the entire movie was trying to erase lol

If one lesson to learn from the ending of this movie is that Hate attracts Hate! The Hate you give comes right back to you! May take a while, but it always catches up with you!

It's like eating poison and expecting the one you hate to get sick.

Irony that whites can change ... blacks still shooting

I got a very different impression from this movie. At The end the boy gets murdered and cold blood by somebody who hated him. The hate will continue and it In real life it certainly Did. I view this as more of a tragedy where each side has made valid points that cannot coexist, not dissimilar from our political issues toda

​@@cheyenne11114i agree. Its about the cycle of hatred. A black killed their firefighter dad. He joins the white supremacists and kills blacks. His brother idolizes him and follows his path. The black kod kills him. The black who killed theor father set future events in motion that ruined many lives, white and black included.

It's a movie, not a documentary.

@Kunt5113 ...yes, I know. You never watched a movie in class?

@@Tonymarony5113doesn’t make it less effective in bringing a point across.

@larrygarcia6356 What I'm pointing out is that a lot of people look at this as factual. Ot isn't at the bare minimum. There have been some poetic liberties taken. If you want to educate children, use a documentary so everything is real. The creators of this movie have an agenda.

@@Tonymarony5113 agenda or not, this is very real. Doesn’t make that much of a difference if it’s set in a documentary style. Plus I can relate to it. That’s how it’s effective.

dang i thought ive been here before :D nice thumbnail

Lots of speeches in this movie are true That’s what makes it great.

What about the speech was true? Not sure what you meant by this.

@@underAtack I think he means true as in that’s what happens at some family tables. Very sad but true.😢

he's right that hippie Jewish bullshit doesn't belong at the dinner table lol

​@@underAtack maybe try to listen better.

That would have ruined the movie for me

@@ikhoonyejelem2967 same here

Weird how he started off right at the beginning and then regressed at the end

The ending pretty much justified his hate all along. They took his neighborhood, his dad, his brother, broke into his property, assaulted him on the court because they were losing etc. Hate isn't always taught. Sometimes it's learned through experience.

Apparently, the original ending was just going to show him standing in front of a mirror and starting to shave his head. But Norton used his power and overruled the writer and director. Powerful either way.

Move to Atlanta for a few years and see how ya feel

Yes. That is a side effect of living in a racially/culturally homogeneous society. An introduction of other cultures into your society will shift your view, regardless of your (dis)approval of those cultures. And when those cultures are accompanied by different races, then the target of your (dis)approval becomes even more clear.

Don't look now, but you are being genocided. I'm close to you age & have learned the importance of maintaining your culture, your heritage, which includes your DNA. I hate no one, but am awake to the reality that the propaganda, such as is presented in this film is intended to get us to surrender those things, and thereby, go extinct as a people. Those who realize this yet embrace multiculturalism are sick and evil people.

Well you lived on opposite sides of the tracks that’s why I’ve grown to hate everyone equally growing up in a ghetto crackheads, hustlers and killers are all the same no matter the color race only matters in prison

The best thing you can do is love and form an alliance with your neighbors. That will get you through tough times.

Yep is very powerful and important also sad.

“Once Were Warriors” is a definite MUST! 💯🔥🤙🏽😎

Once We’re Warriors is amazing.

Great recommendation! That is an awesome film from NZ. Would love to see that review.

We watched it in English class when we were 17. It was shocking and hard to watch, but to this day, one of my favorite movies

God bless you man and congratulations on being able to think for yourself and change....that's huge💪🏽🙏🏼.

@@shaunkeating9288 Bless. 🙏💯

I can only imagine how much better your life is now than it would have been. When we’re young we are easily impressionable. Adults know this and take advantage of it. Glad you made it out of that.. safely.

yah right. sure buddy.

You opened your eyes to the real truth. Never let other people mentally enslave you through hate.

This is not "hard" to get through there are some tough things to see like human mutilation, the curb stomp, and the rape scene is hard. two scenes out of a 3 hour educational movie isn't hard to get through.

@@Stadt101 what do you mean by that

@@nathaniel2874 not sure what answer you are looking for its pretty clear. its not hard to watch other then 2 scenes.

@@Stadt101 ok

@@Stadt101 Jews are evil

Romper Stomper is such a cracking movie, I can't believe reactors are still overlooking it.

The Romer Stomper Movie is so Punk NZ/AUS...I know, as a headbanger, these were our Brothers, but some went just too far...

Romper Stomper is an amazing movie, very realistic, brutal. Rise of the foot solider is an other amazing movie.

Romper stomper was a dumb movie.

Too bad the 13% dont let go of it because they keep killing and hurting people, including Danny's dad the firefighter.

Are you going to make black people stop hating?

Incredible film!

an all time favorite of mine. "It aint white-boy day, is it?"

Definitely. Who else but Tarantino could take a love story and turn it into that🤯🥰 amazing film

@@reneeg9406 David lynch.....

And it was a very apt title...because it was more of a true love story than just about any other movie ive ever seen​@reneeg9406

I think my favorite is "Death to Smoochy".

I was just thinking about how this movie influenced my history day project in 10th grade - hate crime in 20th century America (this was in 2001). It is insane how little of the surface I had scratched with my limited internet access, and yet it just keeps happening. We never learn and instead indoctrinate future generations to the same views and actions.

@@laurarowland3260 you mean in all the democratically run states? Yeah it’s a shitty situation for them to be fed the same BS year after year and to vote for the same idiots.

I'm white and grew up in the hood and would regularly clown black people in sports. We exist.

I watched it once, and I can't ever again. Even with my eyes closed and listening to only the music, I could still see it, and it made me sick.

you hear Derek say just before that "you ever shoot at firemen?". He's internalizing his hate and blaming this guy for the death of his father, even though he never had anything to do with it. That's why he's able to brutally murder him in cold blood.

But the black kid killed the white kid. Mostly just for being white and standing up for himself. Which is what happens to white kids in black areas (maybe not the shooting part but you're definitely a victim if you don't start hurting them worse then they can hurt you). So I don't understand what you mean about ignoring the ending. The ending can be looked at from either point of view. That they were right for hating them-look at what they did. Or that violence and hatred just perpetuates more violence and hatred but if you try to look at it from that angle it doesn't make complete sense because what did Danny do other than stand up for himself and the other white kid?

⁠@@thejohn6614He’s a skinhead? Lmao.

@@ninjireal what's your point? Racism among whites is looked at as this horrible thing and we have terms for them such as skinhead and Nazi but what about racism among blacks. Racism among blacks is much more common than among whites. It's just socially accepted and encouraged. But put a kid into one of those black neighborhoods and schools and he's either going to be a constant victim or he's going to start hurting all the blacks that mess with him and if he shows hatred he will be labeled as the problem because he's some sort of white supremacist despite him being a victim of racism. I know this because I'm white and from Chicago where I was one of the few white kids at my school. They all hated me just because I was white. I had to fight pretty often just so I wasn't a constant victim. Things aren't as simple as just saying "he's a skinhead." And that's the end of it. I've known skinheads that were ignorant as fuck and just jumped on the hate boat. I've also known skinheads that were extremely intelligent and had reasons to believe what they believed and mostly just wanted to be left alone and not fucked with by blacks anymore.

You know he had to flip back or at least go on a rampage after his brother. He was a hard man anyway.

OMG ty. The overall message of this movie is that. Hate is wrong no matter what color you are. I don't like wat they are doing nowadays and we should talk about it more.

"What you've just said is one of the most insanely idiotic things I have ever heard. At no point in your rambling, incoherent response were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this room is now dumber for having listened to it. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul."

Same here. The man is amazing. He should be more well known. He is such an amazing actor and musician. His performance as Benjamin Sisko in Deep Space Nine was unparalleled. (Not to mention this film as well.) Such an underrated actor.

It's so hard for me to watch, I cried so much watching this movie. Also the fact that we are still dealing w this today. 😢

Meh, he fucked around and found out

Yup, same nonsense spoken by the same people. Hate, hate, hate....

@@lazylightning1197 this movie is propaganda..

@@lewisgraham4239 Your parents were brother and sister, weren't they?

@@lazylightning1197 i imagine you like to loot stores too? The system keeping you down?

Your name 💀

@@tcrijwanachoudhury thank you

@@cajuncoonass5053 I think she doesn't know that he is a neo nazi including her girlfriend

Not as hard as Derek’s boot…

@@ninjireal yeah you right