Leary American History X

In the movie, American History X, the scene that stood out to me the most was the scene where Derek is getting put in handcuffs. This particular scene really seems to send a white supremacy message to the lower-class racist young people, especially white males, in the world. The reason lower-class racist white males would pay attention to this scene would be because it shows a white racist male being very powerful and showing his racist thoughts towards blacks. This audience would probably take pride in this scene and rather enjoy it. The reason this scene illustrates the idea of Nazism attracting this specific group of young people is because Derek seems to be someone to look up to for this class of people. He has a huge Nazi sign across his heart showing that being racist towards Nazis is what is in his heart and what is most important to him. He is also smiling in this scene when he is being put into cuffs, showing that he is proud of what he has done which would make this audience also feel what Derek is feeling.

This scene starts of with Derek running outside and shooting the two men breaking into his car. Immediately, the audience realizes the scene is in black and white meaning that it is a flashback. This black and white filming makes the audience truly realize the segregation going on in these flashbacks. This symbolizes that there are no grey areas, just black and white meaning that the African Americans and Caucasian whites do not mix well together. This already makes the audience feel the sense of tension between the two races.

Even though this scene is pretty long, the main part that I thought was an example of white supremacy that sent a message to a group of young people was right when the police came. After Derek killed one man by shooting him and killed the other by stomping on his head then spitting on him, the cops showed up. There is a lot of soft music in this scene and not a lot of voices which shows that what is happening in the scene is very important. This makes it so that the audience only focuses on the characters in the scene. The music playing almost calming. I think they chose this music because it sort of calms the audience down since what just happened what very disturbing. This music might of also been chosen to represent that what Derek did was not something horrifying in his eyes. You see Danny’s face in a close up, staring at Derek in disbelief. The close up makes the audience feel close with Danny and feel what Danny is feeling. Close ups tend to make the audience relate to the character on a better level.

Next you see the cops yell at Derek to put his hands on his head. Derek looks very powerful in this stance because his Nazi sign is very bold and dark over his chest. This sign is standing out because he has just killed two men and by seeing him smile while seeing this sign seems like he is very proud of being racist. Derek also looks very powerful by the way the camera is slightly tilted upward, which makes it seem like we are looking up to him. You can see Derek’s muscles in this scene, which adds to how powerful Derek looks. When Derek puts his hands on his head, he faces Danny and has a strange smirk on his face. He is smiling as if he is proud of killing two men that didn’t deserve to actually die. It was a bit strange at first to see him smiling while being taken away to jail for murder but then you realize why he is actually smiling. This also seems to show white supremacy since Derek looks like he is a powerful white males that is superior to the black men he has just killed.

In the article we read, it talked about how this movie was a racist movie where whites are superior to other races. Even though I don’t think that the movie as a whole is a racist movie, but many scenes individually are very racist. This scene in particular is one of the most racist scenes in the movie, which agrees to what the article was saying about white supremacy. It also states in the article that blacks are stereotyped as violent thugs, which is supported by this scene since the blacks were breaking into a car. It also says how white characters are shown as the heroes, which is also supported by this scene because Derek is acting as a hero that stopped blacks from committing a crime.