Hands Up, Don't Shoot

Movies: The Hate U Give

The Hate U Give, directed by George Tillman Jr. and based on the novel (which I haven't read yet) by Angie Thomas, was everything I expected it to be and much, much more. I expected a difficult, yet empowering film about a young, black girl's experience witnessing the death of her friend at the hands of a trigger-happy cop. And yes, that is the moment the plot centers upon. But The Hate U Give  (which is the first half of what Tupac said "thug life" stands for: The Hate U Give Little Infants Fucks Everyone) also shows details and intersectionalities of black lives and black families that I had never considered before.

Though PG-13, The Hate U Give is very tense and a very difficult film overall. Starr Carter (Amandla Stenberg, a revelation in this star-making role) is a high school student who lives in a black neighborhood but goes to a private school with (mostly) white kids. She constantly code switches between "Starr Version One": a girl who is comfortable with her blackness and loves her supportive black community, and "Starr Version Two": a girl who downplays her blackness to avoid attention at her high school. Starr V2 is friends with a white girl who constantly drops microaggressions around her and dates a white boy (KJ Apa, who plays Archie on Riverdale and is full-blown Archie in this movie as well: sweet and oblivious) who says "I don't see color". One of these two white kids actually ends up listening to Starr and learning, while the other sinks deeper into their own racism until Starr is forced to cut them loose.

Starr has a pretty good model for code-switching in her parents. Her mom, Lisa (a luminous Regina Hall), is more concerned about her children's safety than social activism while her dad, Maverick (Russell Hornsby) gives his preteen children the Black Panther's 10-point program and expects his kids to memorize it (there WILL be a quiz). Maverick also spent time in prison for selling drugs, after he willingly took the fall for neighborhood drug lord King (Anthony Mackie, quietly menacing). This is where The Hate U Give truly reveals what a brave and layered film it is: it points out that there is violence and oppression within the black community as well as outside of it. The film is deft and unflinching in its handling of the hard truth that sometimes people who live in difficult circumstances turn to illegal means to make money and while that is wrong and can destroy an otherwise loving community from within, there are reasons--logical reasons--behind it. The Hate U Give walks the most delicate tightrope of not excusing illegal and violent behavior while also not turning it into a cliche or an excuse to be racist against people who engage in such behavior.

The central moment of The Hate U Give is devastating. Starr has recently reconnected with Khalil (Algee Smith)--a childhood friend she used to play Harry Potter with--at a party. He gives her a ride home and they share a kiss even though Starr is hesitant because she's dating Archie Chris. As they drive, police lights flash at them and they're pulled over because Khalil failed to signal a lane change. Starr, having received "the talk" from her father at a young age, immediately puts her hands on the dashboard and complies with the cop's instructions, but Khalil does not--he argues with the cop and, crucially, when told to keep his hands where the cop can see them, reaches into the car for a hairbrush, and is fatally shot.

It's important, I think, that Khalil's choice to reach into the car is ambiguous enough that you can understand on some level why a cop--trigger-happy and maybe genuinely nervous--would shoot him. There's an incredibly important scene later on where Starr discusses what happened with her Uncle Carlos (Common, who is fucking amazing in everything) who just happens to *also* be a cop. Carlos explains from the cop's point of view what might have been going through his head: Was it dark? Could he see clearly? Why was Khalil arguing with the cop in the first place? Did he have something to hide? Again, The Hate U Give walks a tightrope here: ultimately, we know the cop could have deescalated the situation but instead chose to shoot first, ask questions later, most likely because Khalil was a young black man. If Khalil had been white, he could have done the exact same thing and lived--that's racism. But also this cop wasn't presented as a sociopathic villain who took delight in killing someone. Also a good choice for the film: there is very little focus on the cop (#115 as Starr calls him, since she takes note of his badge) at all in the film. The Hate U Give isn't about whether Khalil "deserved" to be shot (he didn't), it's about Starr's harsh, yet beautiful coming of age where she realizes she needs to use her voice to give Khalil's death some meaning and to fight the racism that she encounters daily and has been turning away from as a coping mechanism.

The Hate U Give is brutally honest in it's insistence that there are no easy answers. "The world is complex" says Uncle Carlos. He's right. "It doesn't seem very complex to me" retorts Starr. She's also right. The world is both black and white and also gray. Racism can't be solved JUST with riots and protests or JUST with trials and rule of law. It needs both. Both passion and anger, as well as boring policy changes and rules. Racism must be solved quickly--and slowly. White people need to understand racism. And so do black people. All of these supposed contradictions turn out not to be contradictions at all, but sort of a fucked up knot that we need everyone's help to solve.

Throughout the film, Starr has multiple conversations about "The Hate U Give Little Infants Fucks Everyone". Khalil tells her it means is that children who experience racism and hate grow up to go "wild" and violent. Starr's dad asks her what she thinks it means, and she says "I think it's more than just the youth". Basically, the hate black people of all ages experience at the hands of white people fucks everybody. But at the end of the movie, with both gang violence and police brutality looking down the barrel of a gun at Starr and her family, she realizes "It's the hate we give". The hate that comes from outside of communities and from within communities that harms everyone. I didn't see this as a cop-out (pun not intended) or a "but black violence too!!!" type of whataboutism, but rather a universal message that hate from one human to another always comes back to bite everyone in the ass. It's not a one-way street. It's not a two-way street. It's one of those fucking confusing roundabouts in DC where you can't tell where to turn off and if you pick the wrong street it's an extra 20 minutes added to your trip.

I recommend The Hate U Give to anyone and everyone. From my perspective as a liberal white person who strives to be good and not be racist, I can speak to people like me: you will be uncomfortable. You will be confronted with racism and prejudice inside yourself you didn't know existed. Your comfortable white, liberal attitudes about who is wrong and who is right might be challenged and, if you're willing to lean in to the discomfort, you just might emerge with a deeper sense of these issues and have more tools in your arsenal as an ally. The Hate U Give goes beyond pat storytelling with easy answers and clear heroes and villains and victims. Because black people aren't characters on a screen to help white people learn to be better. They're human beings who are being killed for no reason at all and it's wrong to look away or pretend otherwise.

Grade: A-