American History X
American History X
High school student Danny Vinyard antagonizes his Jewish history teacher Murray by choosing to write a civil rights essay on Mein Kampf. African-American principal and outreach worker Dr. Bob Sweeney tells Danny that he will study history through current events or be expelled, calling their class American History X. Danny's first assignment is a paper on his older brother Derek, a past student of Sweeney's and former neo-Nazi leader released from prison that day.
Years earlier, Danny and Derek's father, a fireman, was shot and killed by a black narcotics dealer while putting out a fire at their home. Immediately after his death, Derek erupts in a racially motivated tirade in a televised interview. High-profile neo-Nazi Cameron Alexander becomes Derek's mentor and they form their own violent white supremacist gang called the Disciples of Christ (D.O.C.) in Venice Beach. A skilled basketball player, Derek is dragged into a game against several Crips, winning control of the local ball courts. Derek organizes an attack on a supermarket employing illegal Mexican immigrants.
Derek's mother Doris invites Murray, her boyfriend, for dinner where an argument about Rodney King and the 1992 Los Angeles riots occurs. Derek assaults his sister Davina and openly berates Murray, and Doris tells Derek to leave home. That night, the same group of Crips that Derek had beaten in the basketball game earlier attempt to steal his truck. When Danny alerts Derek to the crime, Derek shoots two of the men, killing one and wounding the other, before curb stomping the wounded man. He is arrested and sentenced to three years in the California Institution for Men for voluntary manslaughter.
In prison, Derek joins the Aryan Brotherhood and befriends a black inmate named Lamont. Derek becomes disillusioned by prison gang politics; he believes in the ideology but disapproves of the gang's dealings with non-white gangs and involvement in narcotics dealing, thinking that the members are only using the philosophy of white supremacy out of convenience. He loses his belief further when his friends in the D.O.C. never visit him in prison. He ultimately abandons the Aryan Brotherhood, who beat and rape him in the shower in retaliation. Derek is visited in the hospital wing by Sweeney, with whom he pleads for help to get out of prison. Sweeney rebukes Derek and reveals his own racist past, and warns that Danny has become involved with the D.O.C. to follow in Derek's footsteps. After recovering and leaving the hospital wing, Derek ignores the Aryan Brotherhood while Lamont warns that he may be targeted by African-American gangs now that he is no longer under the Aryan Brotherhood's protection. An attack never comes, and Derek spends the remainder of his sentence alone. When he is released, Derek thanks Lamont, whom he realizes intervened on his behalf.
Returning home, Derek finds Danny emulating him, sporting a D.O.C. tattoo and becoming a skinhead. Derek tries to persuade him to leave the gang, but Danny feels betrayed. Derek's best friend Seth, also a D.O.C. member, frequently disrespects Derek's mother and sister while grooming Danny for the group; Seth and Danny are closely controlled by Cameron. During a party at the D.O.C's compound, Derek confronts Cameron and calls him out for using him only to abandon him for three years; declaring his departure from the group and refusal to allow them to use Danny the same way, he brutally beats Cameron when the man mocks him. Seth and the others, including Derek's ex-girlfriend Stacey, turn against Derek. Seth holds Derek at gunpoint, but Derek easily disarms him and holds everyone at gunpoint before fleeing with his brother.
Afterwards, Derek tells Danny about his experience in prison, which seems to prompt a change in Danny. The pair return home and remove racist posters from their shared bedroom. The next morning, Danny completes his paper, reflecting on his reasons for adopting neo-Nazi values, and their flaws. Derek walks Danny to school, stopping at a diner for breakfast. Sweeney and a police officer inform Derek that Seth and Cameron were attacked the night before and are in an intensive care unit. Derek denies having any knowledge or involvement and reluctantly agrees to inspect the people he denounced. In the boys' bathroom, Danny is killed by a black student that he had confronted the day before. Derek runs to the school and, finding Danny's body, mournfully cradles him while blaming himself for influencing Danny's views and actions. In a voiceover, Danny reads the final lines of his paper for Dr. Sweeney, quoting the final stanza of Abraham Lincoln's first inaugural address.
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