HATE (LA HAINE) (1995)

Rating: **** out of ****

HATE's power undeniable

With HATE, French writer-director Mathieu Kassovitz effectively tops the American 'hood genre with a film that masterfully combines reality with poetry. The guns are here, and so is the gutter talk. As if to rub salt in the wound, much of the culture here is derived from the U.S. - they still breakdance, they listen to rap and hip hop, argue over gun trivia from LETHAL WEAPON, wear "killer cuts from New York" and dress in gangsta wear - even the plainclothes policeman wears a Notre Dame Fighting Irish jacket.

The social problems here are different, related more to class than colour, and they adopt things American as if to latch on to an identity denied to them by the French. Nevertheless, hate still breeds hate, and in HATE guns are used as solutions.

Kassovitz's treatment is refreshingly unique, almost elegant. Events seem displaced in time, and Kassovitz celebrates in difference.

When one of the youths commands the lights of the Eiffel Tower go off for him, his two friends jeer him, reminding him that such things happen only in movies. And perhaps because HATE is only a movie, that Paris will accomodate illusions, no matter how unpleasant, much more quickly than provide solutions to its realities, the Eiffel Tower accedes to Said's wish.

HATE will dim most views on the City of Lights. It follows twenty-four hours in the lives of three young men who reside in one of the working class and multi-ethnic housing projects surrounding Paris. All three young men are engaged in petty crimes, have gutter mouths. Said (Said Taghmaoui) is the amiable vandal and smuggler. Vinz (Vincent Cassel) is a most temperamental Jew who had participated in the riots. Hubert (Hubert Kounde) is the thoughtful African boxer and pickpocket.

They share a common aimlessness; they have no jobs, no money and no healthy outlet for amusement so they pass the time by hanging out. Their friendship is a vital one; they are unhesitant about expressing, usually through arguments abundant with vulgarities, their opinions, but these only strengthen the bonds between them as several events during their day attest to.

It is the morning after two days of riots in the projects, and police are still monitoring the streets. The riots were sparked by the near-fatal beating of Abdel, an Arab acquaintance of theirs, while in police custody. The police brutality, the resulting riots and revenge against the "pigs" provides the fodder for much of their discussions, from which it is clear they identify easily with Abdel.

When a police gun lost during the riots falls into Vinz's hands, he assumes a much more confident, troublemaking posture, and he threatens to shoot one of the "pigs" should Abdel die. The role of assassin is something Vinz aspires to, judging by his Travis Bickle pretensions. From this point on every encounter threatens to explode.

Their group instinct may be partly derived from close family relations enhanced, no doubt, by their cramped accomodations; Said berates his younger sister when he finds her skipping school but will not hesitate to end gossip regarding her reputation, Vinz remembers that his grandmother hates red peppers when he does the errands, and Hubert provides some of the family income.

It is clear from their posturing that they are still grasping for some sort of identity, and their conversations with one another reveal a common identification with the comatose Abdel. They're not far from being children themselves: they discuss which Warner Brothers cartoon character is the ultimate "gangsta," and recall the schoolroom lesson that hate breeds hate, to which Vinz adds a corollary learned from the streets, "Turn the other cheek, you're dead...."

The projects are the source of their problems and their identities. Said becomes ecstatic when a policeman in uptown Paris politely addresses him "sir," and Hubert confesses to his mother that he wants to get out of the projects. Vinz's visions of cows betray an idyllic longing. With gun in hand the trio head off to Paris.

The director's sympathies are clearly with the young men. When Said and Hubert are interrogated by a cop for no apparent reason other than to demonstrate intimidation techniques to his rookie partner, one is forced to squirm in their seat.

The cinematography is a wonder. Like the documentary footage which begins the movie, HATE is filmed in black-and-white (the only colour scene shows a molotov cocktail being hurled at a floating Earth, the flames bleaching the colour out), but is the high-contrast kind, much richer and fully-textured treatment, almost classical and elegant. The camera moves in ways to suggest sounds, the swirl of traffic, the passing of time uselessly spent. The background is filled with ads that seem to mock the youths "The world is yours."

The combination of visuals and score is inspired. The opening documentary scenes are accompanied by Bob Marley's "Burning and Looting." A deejay carefully considers a mix of "Nique la Police" and "Je ne regrette rien" (I regret nothing), and the tracking shot follows the music as it soars, birdlike, over the projects. Where difference and disparity lies, Kassovitz finds wonderful mixes.

HATE chillfully reminds that however much they soar that day, the end is unknown. "Like us in the projects. So far, so good. But how will we land?"

"How you fall doesn't matter, it's how you land!" With their lives defined by so little, Said, Vinz and Hubert's lives, like Abdel's, gain significance only with their exit. It is Kassovitz's grand triumph that we care.

Review completed December 28, 1996.