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| photo courtesy of foxmovies.com |
The Hate U Give
is an adaptation of Angie Thomas’ young adult novel of the same name, and it
stars Amandla Stenberg (The Darkest Minds,
Everything Everything) as a teenager
named Starr Carter. Starr lives in Garden Heights, a poor, black neighborhood,
but she goes to school at Williamson, a prep school with mostly wealthy, white
students. After Starr witnesses the murder of a childhood friend, Khalil
Harris (Algee Smith), at the hands of a police officer, she finds her relationships in both
places strained to the breaking point. In the face of a grand jury inquiry and
rising tension in her neighborhood, it’s up to Starr to find the courage to
take a stand for truth.
If you’ve seen a
trailer for The Hate U Give, you know
that it addresses some serious real-world issues, namely police brutality
against black Americans. It addresses these issues head-on, through the lens of one very
specific, very personal experience—the fictional story of Starr Carter—and the
result is a meaningful, thoughtful film that balances weighty subject matters
with well-realized character development.
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| photo courtesy of cosmopolitan.com |
The movie’s success
stems from its willingness to deeply imagine Starr’s world, the people and the situations
that surround her. Even before the shooting that defines the rest of the film, The Hate U Give has a perceptiveness
about the way it approaches scenes. Moments around the dinner table feel real.
Starr’s family and classmates feel like real people you’ve met before. The situations
that Starr encounters—both fortunate and unfortunate—ring true. As we watch the
shooting change Starr and change her relationships, we sense the weight of that
shift.
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| photo courtesy of mpaa.com |
And The Hate U Give channels its
perceptiveness into a number of really brilliant, insightful moments. The
script, written by Audrey Wells, composes scenes that often say far more than they
appear to say on the surface, sometimes with just a few words. One such scene
sees the wealthy prep school students hold a “walk-out” protest in response to
the shooting. Unlike Starr, for whom Khalil’s death is very real, these
students are just using it as an excuse to get out of school, and when Starr
sees the inherent hypocrisy in their protest, she leaves. It’s a short scene,
but it encapsulates much of what The Hate
U Give has to say not only about violence but about what it looks like to
take a stand against violence. As the narrative progresses, the movie weaves
these scenes together and produces shrewd third act culminations, one of which—a
protest in which the protesters actually do
risk something—serves as a direct foil of the “walk-out.”
Stenberg absolutely
shines as Starr Carter. The script demands a lot from her role—considerably more
than your typical young adult lead—but Stenberg proves more than equal to the
task. She delivers every emotion, every nuance with remarkable skill. Regina
Hall and Russell Hornsby, who play Starr’s parents, also give outstanding
performances.
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| photo courtesy of hollywoodreporter.com |
If there’s anything
working against The Hate U Give, it’s
probably time: you get the sense that it has to sacrifice some things to keep
the runtime manageable. On a couple of occasions, the movie builds up to an important
confrontation… only to sort of gloss over the conflict and move on. It’s a
shame, because those moments are often the places where I most wanted the movie
to dig deeper, where the movie seems like it could have some valuable things
to say. But as movie problems go, leaving the audience wanting more is probably
a good place to be.
The Hate U Give
is rated PG-13.
TRAILER
Watch the trailer here.
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| photo courtesy of nytimes.com |
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