The Hate U Give

The Hate U Give (2018)

Director George Tillman Jr, who directed Men Of Honour and Notorious and also produced Mudbound, was in charge for this drama based on a book by Angie Thomas that debuted at number one on The New York Times young adult best-seller list, where it remained for fifty weeks.

Sixteen year old Starr Carter moves between two worlds: the poor black neighbourhood where she lives and the fancy suburban prep school she attends. The uneasy balance between these worlds is shattered when Starr witnesses the fatal shooting of her childhood best friend, Khalil, at the hands of a police officer. Khalil was unarmed.

This is a story that is sadly all too familiar. It opens with a nine year old Starr (later played by Amandla Stenberg), older brother Seven and infant brother Sakani being given “the talk” by her father Maverick (or Mav, played by Russell Hornsby) …”Put your hands on the dashboard, don’t argue, no sudden movements.” Mav makes it clear that as horrible as it is that children need to hear this speech, it is not a lesson they can ignore.

I’ve not read the book, but the film felt like it had 2 different writers. Whenever the scene had to carry any weight (which given the subject was quite often) I loved the script and the actors showed they could deliver it beautifully. The execution was perfect and provoking and I didn’t want them to stop. Amandla Stenberg was in almost every scene and she was brilliant but for me the nod goes to Russell Hornsby who was breathtakingly good every time he was on screen but that may have been because the above mentioned weighty scenes all had him in them. There were unfortunately other scenes that seemed like they could have been written for a Tyler Perry or a Wayons brother comedy, there were some horribly cliched characters that left me cold and took me out of the movie every time they were on screen. But luckily they were few in number and most of the 133 minute run time was used well.

This film would have been good but there were three exceptional scenes that elevated it to great in my opinion. One in each act. The opening scene which set the tempo to the film, a scene halfway through on the front lawn as Mav lines up his children and tells then they are stronger then anything anyone can throw at them, and the final scene which had my wife grab my arm as it unfolded because of the sheer tension of it.

I saw the trailer for this film when I went to see BlacKkKlansman and I couldn’t help but compare. While both had strong social commentary I didn’t feel like I’d been beaten repeatedly over the head with it when I walked out of the cinema with this one when I very much did with The BlacKkKlansman.

There is no doubt this is a strong movie with plenty to say but unlike the shocking last few scenes of BlacKkKlansman I felt this isn’t a movie about police violence — it’s about the people who have to live with police violence.

All in all I enjoyed this film and the performances from the main two stars are worth the admission price alone. I will now check Russell Hornsby’s back catalogue of work as well as keep a lookout for anything else Amandla Stenberg does.