A movie that had an impact on me...

American History X



I had a little bit of trouble narrowing it down to which movies had a big impact on me. Growing up movies were kind of my babysitter. My parents were young parents, I honestly do not think they really knew what they were doing, but maybe they did... They were still young and hip. They loved the pop music of that time and every movie. They never really had any restrictions for us when it came to viewing a film (except they would make us close our eyes during the sex or violent scenes). Anyways, I had seen lots of movies, when American History X came out I was about 14 or 15, This is still pretty young for this intense movie but because of my upbringing it wasn't an issue for me to watch it. I also have an older sister that shared movies with me and that is who I saw it with.

American History X summarized by IMDB-"A former neo-nazi skinhead tries to prevent his younger brother from going down the same wrong path that he did."

So here is where it got me, one a young brother that loves, admires, wants to be like his older sibling (my sister and I) but the other was the issue with race. As we know a skin-head is someone whom basically despises every race beside their our white race. I am a half-Italian/half-Hispanic, which was never an issue until I moved to Memphis, where I was picked on for being Mexican by both white and black children. Before moving here though, in 1991, My grandfather was murdered in Memphis. He owned a liquor store in a not so great part of town and was robbed and shot five times in the chest by three young black males. My family(mother, aunts and uncle) all struggled with excepting and befriending blacks for a while after that tragic event. I never understood why they all felt that way because I know that we can not judge, and any race could have done this to my grandfather. Would they have hated an Italian man if he had shot my PoopyJoe? I don't know. It wasn't until after I saw this movie that really made me think that we need to give people a chance and should not judge them by the color of their skin. My family has overcome their feelings toward black people and I know that their were just hurting and had to blame someone.

This movie does have a horrible sad ending but it made me think about how you can affect someone else, that you should really treat people like you want to be treated. If you treat someone badly they may not handle it the way you expect. As surprising as the ending is in this film I think I liked it because I, in a way could relate. I felt that this could have been a real life story, could have really happened. It made me think and was definitely memorable, and I can honestly say that I have seen it several times and I would watch it again.