I saw The Hate U Give tonight, and I have thoughts…
But first, let get some of the mechanicals out of the way. First of all, the casting was stellar. I would especially commend Yesi Ramirez for the work to find this team of players that blended in so effortlessly in their roles. In nearly every scene and interaction they were superb. I do not know enough of what the director George Tillman Jr. or the writer Angie Thomas (novel) and Audrey Wells (screenplay) were looking for exactly with the white actors for “Hailey” and “Chris,” but I winced at their portrayals. They felt accurate and yet–oh my god. The mirror that is held up, even at the end, with these two. The sets, the location shots, the costumes, the makeup–oh, the tattoos!–the artwork in the sets–such careful attention to detail!–the lighting, the shots themselves–the camera work was stellar. Great attention was paid to the music, with some obvious things that made me tilt my head at something that I said “what is that doing in this movie?”–but the movie made it clear a few seconds later, every time.
But let’s talk about the main characters. I will speak of Russell Hornsby, Regina Hall, Anthony Mackie, Issa Rae, and Common–every one of them embodied their characters. I am especially commenting on the Regina, Russell, and Anthony–every movement, every nuance of tone, every lift of an eyebrow or the tilt of a head–just perfect. I confess I don’t see many films with Anthony, but in this one he plays a menacing, violent man who is yet connected through what are perhaps slim bonds of affection with the others.
Of the two male children, Lamar Johnson and TJ Wright fill in their roles believably. I note TJ, “Sekani,” feels real. It’s hard to cast young children in roles–often they seem to rush their lines, but TJ is just there with his role. And Lamar as “Seven,” who must move between families, being part of two, but he plays a young man who takes it in and just does what he needs to.
And Amandla Stenberg as Starr Carter? There are no words. She handles a most difficult role of someone who must live between two worlds, code switch constantly, try to guard her feelings–and all this while she witnesses horrific events.
The film does not glorify the horror, the terror, or the violence. The film appears to be cautious and even neutral in outlook at the terror. But it is there.
Young Khalil (Algee Smith), Starr’s first crush, experiences terrible injustice, and Starr is the sole eyewitness. And like every black victim, he is a thug first and foremost–never mind he was Ron to Starr’s Harry Potter, her friend from childhood, a young man attempting to bear too much responsibility for the health and care of his family.
And this is what the film is about, if it is about anything you want to put a finger on. That the daily life of people in America has already been constrained before the sun rises. Set in the fictional town of Freemont, in the Garden Heights, it is Ferguson and Miami Gardens and Cleveland and Compton and Oakland and Detroit and St. Louis and South Central and Rainier Valley and every place where Americans live their lives as much as they can in sight of the big city that’s off limits to them.
The initiating event is what happens to Khalil and Starr, and while I knew it was coming I was still jolted. I did not recover the rest of the movie as terrible, predictable, and unavoidable events happen, one after the other, all as planned and designed, all to make life miserable and stifled and constricted. The Establishment and the Man are coolly unconcerned about it all, except when the misery and the rage and the anger attempt to break out–it’s met with ordinary resistance that duly escalates as the outrage intensifies. Whether it is in reaction to the outrage or not doesn’t really even matter. This is how everyone reacts as if it’s expected–the outrage and then the pushback out of the streets and out of the city.
I want to point out Common here. He is cast as a police officer, Starr’s uncle, and he has a speech that is utterly chilling in its words and meaning. And it is all the more unsettling coming from a recognizable character such as Common–for me, the most recognizable face in the cast, and someone I’ve appreciated for years for his restrained artistry. Here he is restrained and reasonable–but it is an awful reasonableness.
TuPac is in here, too. A presence even in his absence. His words and lyrics are quoted and woven through the movie, especially the line of The Hate U Give Little Infants (Effs up) Everything–THUG LIFE. (The movie tends to use “Effs” but IIRC Russell Hornsby’s character, “Maverick,” isn’t so delicate.
And yeah, that line brings the circle back to the beginning in the end. It is one of the times in the movie where I had yet even more increasing dread of terror and horror and violence and survival.
Which is how the movie designed it to be.
Now, as for my reactions.
I didn’t know what I was going in for. I knew it was out as a movie, and I’ve heard some buzz, and it has some great recommendations from people I read on Twitter–but there was not a whole heck of a lot of reveal in those texts.
Which was good, because I got to the movie a little apprehensive at subjecting myself to such a raw display.
And it was two hours of twists and turns and of wincing and heartbreak.
Yet through it all the characters in this movie hold it together because they must.
I don’t have any words to offer to you if you haven’t seen it beyond that I think you should see it because it is so utterly human and hopeful (yes, hopeful). I think you should see it because it is revelatory and complex. And I think you should see it because it represents the voice of people we just don’t often hear in this rawness and honesty.
I was overwhelmed in the theatre to the point where I couldn’t much react anymore by the end. I was exhausted by the tightness of my emotions and the unreliability of my feelings.
How tiring and wearying it was to watch this and experience it in the movie theatre.
Imagine how tiring and wearying it must be to live the lives that are represented in this movie.
Recommendation: 9/10 — a few nits here and there where the scene could have used a retake of some of the younger actors. But as close to 10 as you can get.