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Toma's Review Of: American History X (1998)
Short Summary Of My Review
American History X is only worth the watch for Edward Nortons (albeit amazing) performance. The directing hinders the film severyly and I have not seen another Tony Kaye since. Edward Furlong is bland and doesn’t believably portray being a white supremacist. 7/10.
Full Review
I loved Fight Club (and need to write a review of it soon), so I was super excited to see Edward Norton in one of his first movies. He plays his character scarily believably in white supremacist mode and conflicted about his past / saving his little brother mode. This is partially theory and partially truth: Edward Nortons cuts saved the movie from being unwatchable. In the past, what he added to Fight Club and Red Dragon camera, editing, and script wise all elevated the movie. Edward’s cut famously made it to the theater over Tony Kaye’s, which he got very mad about equally famously. Judging by how terrible the casting and some of the shots are, I think Edward Norton made it watchable and Warner Brothers saw that, choosing his cut of partial slop over Tony Kaye’s slop fest.
Now for the bad (i.e. Tony Kaye). I can find someway to pick apart every scene, so I will pick a very climactic one. The rape scene in prison with Edward Norton 1, doesn’t make sense because his skinhead friends were hanging out with non-whites too, and 2, the slow mo effect takes away from the tension of the scene for no reason, and then is apologized for by being overly graphic and long. Then the cut where the rapist hits his head on the wall is cut super choppy. Theres 2 shots that look smooth, and then his head teleports 3 inches in front of where it was very noticeably.
Edward Furlong weighs down Edward Nortons’ performance as well because he is monotone and not in character. He acts weirdly conflicted about his white supremacist view, even though he’s supposed to be fully commited to his skinhead community so that Norton has to save him. Without that there is literally no plot to the movie. Now, his character could be in full support of white supremacy, but apprehensive / knows it’s wrong, but it doesn’t come off like that because Furlongs performance is so flat. He just seems like his words are changing but not his emotions. Side note; Edward Nortons cuts biggest difference was (allegedly) whittling down Furlongs screentime. Amazing actor hindered by a very meh director that casted a less then meh protagonist. 7/10.
