This was released 25 years ago, but still feels relevant. Especially with what is going on in America (once again), with the killing of George Floyd. Now the movie does not concentrate on Black Lives Matter (the movement did not exist back then), but focuses on police brutality, a seemlingless inescapable path french youth in certain areas was facing (probably still are facing).

The perfomances are quite stunning and while we do have the youth we concentrate on, there are some diverse views on how to act or where to go. The youth, the characters we follow are prisoners ... they are what society and circumstances made them. There are cultural references to movies for exmaple, be it Scarface "World is yours", Taxi Driver "talking to me" to name but two. The latter is not quoted correctly if the french translation of what is being said is to be believed. But that makes it better, many missquote movies or make them their own. Vincent Cassel is not spoofing De Niro, he makes it a short but powerful moment in the movie.

And that is just the beginning. The three friends, different but yet with a core feeling of being sidelined, of not being heard, of being minimalized, is quite intriguing. You feel for them and yet it is very likely you will hate some of their actions. Instead of cancelling them though, how could we help them? The movie does not suggest solutions in that regard. It almost works like a documentary. A gritty, brutal one, that some may call bleak ...

When the youth Abdel goes to the hospital in coma due to a battering he receives at the police station, there are riots in the outskirts of Paris and one policeman loses his revolver. On the next morning, the Arab Said (Saïd Taghmaoui) summons his Jewish friend Vinz (Vincent Cassel) and they meet the black boxer Hubert (Hubert Koundé) in the slum where they live. Soon Vinz shows the missing gun that he found in the night before and he tells that if Abdel dies, he will revenge his friend killing a police officer. The trio of troublemaker and pothead friends head to the downtown of Paris where they spend the day asking for trouble. On the end of the long night, tragedy happens.

The awarded "La Haine" is an impressive French movie that follows along 24 hours, the lives of three idle friends from a poor suburb of Paris that belong to a lost generation. I saw this movie in the 90's and today I have decided to see it again to compare the situations shown in the movie with what is recently happening in Brazil with several riots and it is amazing the similarities: lost youths with neither instruction nor job; unprepared and brutal police force; low quality of life in the slums or ghettos in the outskirts of the big cities (in Brazil, there are several slums also in the noble areas). The only difference is basically that France belongs to the First World and Brazil to the Third World; the rest is identical. My vote is eight.

Title (Brazil): "O Ódio" ("The Hate")

Three young friends are hanging out after the immigrant housing projects exploded against the police in a riot the night before. Vinz (Vincent Cassel) is a Jew and sees himself as a gangster. Saïd (Saïd Taghmaoui) is a loud-mouthed Arab. Hubert (Hubert Koundé) is a black boxer. Their friend Abdel was arrested and hospitalized after getting beaten by the police. Vinz has a gun and vows to kill a cop if Abdel dies. Rioters had looted a police station.

This movie tries to take on some compelling modern issues. The problem is that the group of friends is so diverse. Instead of realism, the movie seems to be trying to be PC. The movie is missing the religious aspect of the fighting and basing it solely on social class. On the other hand, it tackles the police issue head on. Vinz really needs to be something other than a Jew. The rest is great.