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Essays on The Hate U Give

Hook examples for "the hate u give" essays, anecdotal hook.

Step into the shoes of Starr Carter as she navigates the complexities of identity, racism, and activism in "The Hate U Give."

Question Hook

What happens when a teenager witnesses a tragic act of police brutality? Explore the profound questions raised by Angie Thomas in her gripping novel.

Quotation Hook

"Sometimes you can do everything right and things will still go wrong. The key is to never stop doing right." — Angie Thomas, "The Hate U Give." Reflect on the powerful messages embedded in this quote.

Statistical or Factual Hook

"The Hate U Give" spent 80 weeks on The New York Times Best Seller list and has been adapted into a critically acclaimed film. Explore the cultural impact of this work.

Definition Hook

What does it mean to be an activist in the face of injustice? Delve into the novel's portrayal of activism and social responsibility.

Rhetorical Question Hook

Can literature be a catalyst for change? Discover how "The Hate U Give" has sparked important conversations about race, inequality, and police violence.

Historical Hook

Explore the historical context of systemic racism in the United States and how it informs the events of "The Hate U Give."

Contrast Hook

Contrast Starr's two worlds: her predominantly black neighborhood and her predominantly white private school. This contrast drives the narrative's central conflict.

Narrative Hook

Follow Starr's journey as she finds her voice and confronts her fears, all while grappling with the legacy of Tupac Shakur's "THUG LIFE."

Shocking Statement Hook

Prepare to be shocked by the harsh realities and injustices depicted in "The Hate U Give." This story is a powerful wake-up call to the issues plaguing society.

Depiction of Racism and Injustive in "The Hate U Give"

The activism of black people in the hate u give, made-to-order essay as fast as you need it.

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The Interpretation of Tragedy in The Hate U Give

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The Hate U Give: Growing Up Black in a White World

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Gender and Racial Discrimination on Example of "Hidden Figures" & "The Hate U Give"

Racial injustice in the hate u give, starr’s approach on the hate u give, social aspects of racial discrimination in the hate u give, choices and fate: the other wes moore and the hate u give, how to overcome struggles in life: bravery in the hate u give, the hate u give: an analytical exploration.

February 28, 2017, Angie Thomas

Bildungsroman; Young Adult Fiction

Starr Carter, Khalil Harris, Maverick “Big Mav” Carter, Lisa Carter, Uncle Carlos, Seven Carter, King, Chris, One-Fifteen, Hailey Grant, DeVAnte, Kenya

"The Hate U Give" is a powerful and thought-provoking novel by Angie Thomas. The story follows sixteen-year-old Starr Carter, who lives in a poor, predominantly Black neighborhood while attending a predominantly white private school. Starr's life takes a tragic turn when she witnesses the fatal shooting of her childhood friend, Khalil, at the hands of a police officer. The incident sparks outrage and protest in her community, and Starr finds herself caught between two worlds as she navigates the aftermath. Haunted by the traumatic event, Starr becomes determined to speak up for Khalil and fight for justice. As she confronts systemic racism, police brutality, and the weight of her own voice, she finds herself torn between fear and the need to make a difference. With the support of her family and friends, Starr finds the courage to stand up against injustice, challenging the status quo and advocating for the truth.

"The Hate U Give" is set in the contemporary United States, primarily in the fictional neighborhood of Garden Heights, a predominantly Black and low-income community. Garden Heights is plagued by poverty, violence, and the constant presence of drugs. The neighborhood is characterized by its strong sense of community and resilience, with tight-knit families and a vibrant culture. In contrast, Starr Carter, the protagonist, attends Williamson Prep, a predominantly white private school located in a wealthier neighborhood. The school represents a stark contrast to Starr's home environment, with its privilege, affluence, and racial divide. The story also takes place in various other settings, including Starr's home, the Carter family's store, and the courtroom where the trial against the police officer unfolds. Each setting plays a significant role in depicting the stark differences in social, economic, and racial dynamics present in the lives of the characters.

1. Racial Injustice: The novel confronts the deep-rooted racial inequalities and systemic racism that persist in society. It addresses issues such as police brutality, racial profiling, and the unequal distribution of power, shedding light on the unequal treatment and discrimination faced by Black individuals. 2. Identity and Authenticity: The theme of identity is central to the story. The protagonist, Starr, grapples with the pressure to code-switch between her predominantly white school and her predominantly Black neighborhood. The novel explores the challenges of navigating multiple identities and the importance of embracing one's authentic self. 3. Voice and Activism: The power of using one's voice to speak out against injustice and effect change is a significant theme in the novel. Starr finds her voice and becomes an activist, challenging the silence and demanding accountability for the injustices she witnesses. 4. Family and Community: The importance of family and community support is a recurring theme. The novel explores the strength and resilience found within the Carter family and the wider community of Garden Heights, highlighting the power of unity and support in the face of adversity. 5. Empathy and Understanding: The novel emphasizes the importance of empathy and understanding across racial and cultural lines. It encourages readers to step into the shoes of others, confront their biases, and strive for a more compassionate and inclusive society.

1. Symbolism: The novel utilizes symbolism to represent larger ideas and themes. For example, the title itself, "The Hate U Give," is a play on the acronym "THUG LIFE" popularized by Tupac Shakur. It symbolizes the cycle of violence and injustice perpetuated by society and the importance of breaking that cycle. 2. Imagery: The author skillfully uses vivid imagery to create a visual and emotional impact on the reader. One example is the description of Khalil's death scene, where the reader can feel the intensity of the moment and the emotions evoked by the tragedy. 3. Foreshadowing: The novel incorporates foreshadowing to hint at future events and build suspense. For instance, early in the story, Starr's father advises her on how to interact with the police, foreshadowing the pivotal role that police violence will play later in the narrative. 4. Flashbacks: Through the use of flashbacks, the author provides insights into the characters' past experiences, allowing the reader to understand their motivations and experiences. These flashbacks add depth to the characters and contribute to the overall narrative.

One example of its representation in media is the 2018 film adaptation directed by George Tillman Jr. The movie received critical acclaim for its faithful adaptation of the novel's themes and characters. It brought the story to a broader audience, allowing viewers to connect emotionally with the characters and the issues they face. The film's powerful performances and visual storytelling captured the essence of the novel, shedding light on the realities of racial inequality and police violence. Another representation of "The Hate U Give" in media is through social media platforms. The hashtag #TheHateUGive gained traction, with readers and viewers sharing their thoughts, personal reflections, and discussions about the book and film. This online discourse provided a space for people to engage with the story's themes and share their own experiences related to racial injustice.

"The Hate U Give" has had a significant influence on both literature and society, inspiring important conversations and igniting a call for social change. The novel's impact stems from its unflinching portrayal of racial injustice, police brutality, and the power of activism. One of the key influences of "The Hate U Give" is its ability to shed light on the experiences and perspectives of marginalized communities, particularly African Americans. Through the authentic voice of the protagonist, Starr Carter, the book provides a window into the struggles and resilience of individuals facing systemic racism. The novel's impact extends beyond the literary world. It has become a rallying cry for social justice movements, sparking activism and raising awareness about police violence. The phrase "The Hate U Give Little Infants F*cks Everybody" (THUG LIFE), which inspired the book's title, has become a powerful slogan representing the interconnectedness of societal problems and the importance of addressing root causes.

"The Hate U Give" made a significant impact upon its release, spending over 80 weeks on The New York Times bestseller list. The book's success is attributed to its engaging narrative and its ability to tackle complex issues with sensitivity and authenticity. It received widespread critical acclaim, winning numerous awards, including the Coretta Scott King Book Award and the William C. Morris Award for Best Debut Novel. The novel's popularity extended beyond the literary world with a successful film adaptation released in 2018. The movie starred Amandla Stenberg as Starr Carter and received critical acclaim for its faithful adaptation and powerful performances. The film further amplified the book's message, reaching a broader audience and sparking important discussions about race and social justice.

"The Hate U Give" is a powerful and important novel that tackles relevant and urgent issues such as racial injustice, police brutality, and systemic oppression. It provides readers with a thought-provoking exploration of the African American experience and the challenges faced by marginalized communities. Writing an essay about "The Hate U Give" allows for a deeper analysis of these themes and their implications in society. Through Starr's perspective, the book examines the emotional and psychological impact of racial trauma, the complexities of code-switching, and the importance of finding one's voice in the face of adversity. Furthermore, "The Hate U Give" encourages critical reflection on systemic racism and the role of activism in effecting social change. By exploring the novel's characters, relationships, and events, an essay can delve into the broader societal implications of racial inequality and the power dynamics at play.

“What's the point of having a voice if you're gonna be silent in those moments you shouldn't be?” “At an early age I learned that people make mistakes, and you have to decide if their mistakes are bigger than your love for them.” “That's the problem. We let people say stuff, and they say it so much that it becomes okay to them and normal for us. What's the point of having a voice if you're gonna be silent in those moments you shouldn't be?” “I can't change where I come from or what I've been through, so why should I be ashamed of what makes me, me?” “Once you've seen how broken someone is it's like seeing them naked—you can't look at them the same anymore.”

1. Angie Thomas. (n.d.). The Hate U Give. Balzer + Bray. 2. Bell, E. (2018). Angie Thomas's The Hate U Give and the problem of radical empathy. Children's Literature in Education, 49(2), 127-138. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10583-018-9355-3 3. Crowe, C. (2018). "That's the point of it, huh? No matter what I do, the two halves of me are at war with each other": Code-switching as a strategy of self-representation in Angie Thomas's The Hate U Give. Children's Literature Association Quarterly, 43(1), 50-69. https://doi.org/10.1353/chq.2018.0002 4. Delgado, E. (2017). A revolution in YA publishing: Angie Thomas' The Hate U Give and the birth of a new activism. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 61(6), 653-657. https://doi.org/10.1002/jaal.784 5. Donovan, L. (2019). Engaging with Angie Thomas's The Hate U Give: Teaching social justice through young adult literature. The ALAN Review, 46(3), 13-22. https://doi.org/10.21061/alan.v46i3.a.3 6. Ebersole, S. (2018). The Hate U Give and the function of the tragic mulatta. The ALAN Review, 45(3), 36-41. https://doi.org/10.21061/alan.v45i3.a.4 7. Hinton, S. E. (2017). The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas. School Library Journal, 63(2), 88. 8. Osgerby, B. (2019). Angie Thomas's The Hate U Give and the history of the contemporary young adult novel. Children's Literature in Education, 50(2), 162-174. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10583-018-9381-1 9. Thomas, A. (2017). The Hate U Give. HarperCollins. 10. Wade, L., & Nourbese, D. P. (2019). "You can't have both": Double-consciousness, critical literacy, and The Hate U Give. Children's Literature in Education, 50(1), 35-49. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10583-018-9380-2

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“The Hate U Give Little Infants Fucks Everybody.” The phrase originally made popular in the '90s by Tupac as an acronym for "THUG LIFE," inspired another work of art, Angie Thomas ’ debut novel, The Hate U Give . The book so successfully connected with a young generation grappling with gun violence and police brutality that it has remained on The New York Times’ bestseller list since its release in February 2017. Now, the film adaptation of its powerful story will attempt to reach an even bigger audience with its Black Lives Matter message.

Both the book and movie follow Starr Carter, a black teenager well-versed in code-switching between her black community in Garden Heights and the prep school her parents send her and her siblings to in the ostentatiously white and wealthy Williamson neighborhood. When the audience first meets her in George Tillman Jr .’s film, her stern-voiced dad, Maverick ( Russell Hornsby ), is teaching his children what to do if a police officer stops the car they’re in. Put their hands on the dashboard; do as they say. It’s the difference between life and death. She is nine-years-old in this scene, her older brother is ten and the youngest member of the Carter family is just a year old, still fussing in his mother’s arms.

The story then jumps forward to when Starr ( Amandla Stenberg ) is a vibrant 16-year-old who plays on her school’s basketball team and finds love in a goofy yet earnest white classmate named Chris (K.J. Apa). But the unintended consequence of having one foot in two different social circles is that you never really feel balanced in either. She feels out-of-place both at her white prep school where white kids love to use black slang and at a neighborhood party her friend brings her to so Starr can help her out in a fight. Starr’s awkward feelings are pushed aside for a moment when an old childhood friend and first crush, Khalil ( Algee Smith ), approaches her with a smile completed by dimples. A fight breaks out at the party, interrupting their meet-cute, and the two drive off in Khalil’s car. On their way back to Starr’s home, the two teens reminisce about old times and even share a kiss. Then, red and blue lights flash. A cop pulls them over for some unexplained reason, and Khalil gets defensive. Starr tries to coach him through her father’s warnings: hands on the dashboard, do what they say. When the cop walks away to run Khalil’s license, the teenager carelessly reaches for his hairbrush to pass the time. Shots ring out, killing Khalil. The officer handcuffs Starr next to her dying friend. He had mistaken the hairbrush in the boy’s hand as a weapon and shot first before asking any questions.

The event is a seismic one for the community and for Starr, who finds herself swept up in the media frenzy and the outrage. She suffers from post traumatic stress and seems to wander the halls of her school, unsure of what’s she doing there at all. Although only a short drive away, her classmates seem entirely disconnected from the problems facing the neighborhood next door. This exasperates Starr, and she begins breaking rank from one of her white girlfriends who really doesn’t understand what’s going on. Her boyfriend, Chris, stumbles through a crash course in how to be an ally, trying his hardest to help her.

The movie feels instructional without getting too preachy, taking time to explain various inequalities and barriers facing black Americans, typically in exchanges between father and daughter. In learning the ways of this unjust system, Starr decides not to accept things the way they are. Her outlook reflects the kind of youth-led movements that have sprung up from Black Lives Matter and the marches against gun violence in schools. The status quo just simply won’t go unchallenged this time.

Stenberg, whose previous credits include other YA fare like “ The Hunger Games ” and “Darkest Minds,” carries the difficult part well, growing from a carefree teen to traumatized kid to a natural born leader before our eyes. She’s hardly alone in her efforts as the supporting cast includes Issa Rae , Anthony Mackie and Common. As Starr’s parents, Hornsby and Regina Hall also share a nuanced and complicated dynamic—a loving couple who feel differently about how best to raise their children, in the difficult neighborhood in which they grew up or elsewhere.

To visually mirror the experience of switching between the worlds of Garden Heights and Williamson, the lighting and color of the scenes also change from warm, familiar tones (Garden Heights) to washed out blue hues (Williamson). The scenes in the Carter household look inviting and well lit, bringing to mind the comfort of a loving family. When Starr is at school, her face looks washed out and pale, as if the screen was trying to mute the colors of everyone’s skin to look the same. She tries so desperately to fit in this environment, she sacrifices who she is in more ways than just avoiding using the slang terms her classmates have co-opted.

In my screening of “The Hate U Give,” there were tears, gasps, laughs and cheers. A shiver rippled through my skin when the shots rang out, and I choked back sobs in many more scenes. It may be a popular movie with arguably simple messages, but it delivers them in emotionally effective ways. We feel for Starr and we are with her in moments like when she confronts a racist friend or questions a reporter for fixating on Khalil’s checkered past. We get a sense of the isolation she feels in her school’s hallway and when she’s forced to watch her friend bleed to death. If the story ever seems too basic, too “intro to race in America,” it’s because this is the story of a 16-year-old girl who’s learning that the world is even worse than what she knew. In the audience, there will likely be many more girls who will either be hearing a story like Starr’s, or recognizing their own experience onscreen, for the first time.

Monica Castillo

Monica Castillo is a critic, journalist, programmer, and curator based in New York City. She is the Senior Film Programmer at the Jacob Burns Film Center and a contributor to  RogerEbert.com .

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Film credits.

The Hate U Give (2018)

Rated PG-13

129 minutes

Amandla Stenberg as Starr Carter

Lamar Johnson as Seven Carter

Regina Hall as Lisa Carter

Russell Hornsby as Maverick Carter

Anthony Mackie as King

Common as Carlos

• George Tillman Jr
• Audrey Wells
• Angie Thomas

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71 The Hate U Give (2018)

Race, Gender, and Policing in The Hate U Give

By Marisa Oritz

An emotional film describing the struggles of those involved in cases of police brutality, The Hate U Give , directed by George Tillman Jr., is an adaptation of the novel written by Angie Thomas. This film makes me eager to watch it over and over because of the message it conveys. It is centered around ideologies and stereotypes of African Americans in society and how the different communities react to certain events. This movie, just like all others, leaves people with different ways of viewing the world. It opens up a new door that gives them an understanding of how and why certain people act and react in that way. Others should be interested in this film because it is a moving and eye-opening story that makes you want to help make a difference in the world. While many films with a dominant black cast pose as “ghetto,” “lower-middle-class,” “violence,” etc., this film, in particular, conveys those adjectives, it does so in a different way. Yes, it shows what people think of when they hear “black community,” but the way the author, director, and producer made this film offers a new way of viewing it. The story, editing, sound design, and cinematography make this film’s message want to see a change in America. The Hate U Give demonstrates the meaning of difference, power, and discrimination by touching on topics of police brutality, white supremacy, African Americans in film, and women in film.

Starr, the main character, is a teenage African American girl who lives in a black community but goes to a dominantly white prep school. Her friends and boyfriend go to the same school and are white. Though back in her hometown, her childhood friend is a teenage African American boy. The storyline is centered around the tragic event of her childhood best friend dying due to police brutality. Starr starts to notice that her friends are not her friends, the cops will not do anything, and she has to make a hard decision about whether to testify in court or not. The gang’s correlation impacts this decision because the boy who died was a part of their crew. Starr takes her anger and frustration out on teaching the public that the way they are thinking and doing things is wrong and that all the fighting and violence needs to stop. Racism has always been an issue in America, but there has been more spotlight on the topic in the past few years. 2020 has had its share of events, and one of those events is the Black Lives Matter movement. This film demonstrates the power that cops have and how African Americans have witnessed or experienced criminal injustices. There has been an increase in protests and movements for creating equality. More and more police brutality cases have been rising from the past and present, demanding that the police who wrongfully harmed or killed those men and women be brought to justice. The film, The Hate U Give, shows and creates emotion like those who lived through a similar event themselves.

There are a few differences in the film that relate to the characters and their environment. There is a difference between privileged and unprivileged seen in different ways in the film. One instance in the movie is how Starr lives in a lower-class neighborhood, and she feels like she can not bring any of her white friends over because they will judge her or will not understand her home life. Later in the film, she allows her rich and privileged boyfriend to take her home from the dance, but he is in a limo (01:27:10-01:27:47). The film shows the limo pulling up to her house, and the viewers can see the difference between the two worlds or privileged and unprivileged. The difference between the lower-middle class and the upper-middle class is highly represented. One distinct difference has to do with Starr’s family situation compared to her African American Uncle. Her uncle lives in a lovely neighborhood where there are no gangs nearby compared to Starr’s dangerous neighborhood where gunshots can be heard at night. There is also the difference in lifestyle when comparing her life [Starr’s] to her school friends. Her friends have luxury items and houses, whereas Starr does not.

There are two forms of power in the film: white power and the power of the truth. White power comes from the dad of the cop who shot the innocent black male. The father and the news paint the picture as having the cop being the victim in the situation. He puts out a statement about him, his son, and his family to defend their title. He is trying to sway the public into believing that it was a horrible mistake saying how they are getting threats and backlash from the event. The news plays footage of black people doing gang-related activities, mentioning how crime in black neighborhoods has increased and how the police are there to help make it a safer place. White power also comes from the murderous cop himself because he was a white cop with reason to believe the black male had a weapon. Therefore after the jury understands that the cop had caused to fire at a supposedly black gang banger male they found the cop not guilty. This power theme seems to happen very often because people like to judge based on social stigmas and ideologies surrounding certain communities. Power in this film also comes from the main character, Starr. After seeing her friend get shot dead by the police, she now has the move to go to trial or stay silent and not become a target. Though, after countless interactions with certain people in her life, it becomes clear to her that some people just do not get it. Starr decides to use her voice and tries to get the police officer who killed her friend imprisoned. She also takes a stand against her so-called best friend after she countlessly makes remarks towards African Americans. Starr confronts Hailey after tension builds up throughout the movie and asks her why others who look like her come off as dangerous and threatening, but she does not (01:39:40-01:40:52). Starr makes a statement towards the police blockade at a street protest, and people follow her lead (01:50:38-01:52:26). Then towards the end of the movie, she steps in front of her little brother with a gun to protect him from getting shot at by the police because he is just a kid who is afraid of the violence. As Jessica King, a well-known movie critique from Variety, put it, “She is also glowingly emblematic of a new American generation unfairly tasked with solving social ills they had no hand in making, but of which they are overwhelmingly the victims” (par. 9). It is rare for films to have a young black female hold power in the movie, though it has become more common.

Discrimination is directly represented on the screen, though there could be some off-screen as well. When talking about on-screen, there is one character that seems to demonstrate discrimination and racism. Hailey, Starr’s school friend, makes comments about black people. Hailey makes remarks about how all black people are dangerous. She tells Starr how her friend who got shot was bound to happen because he was black, lived in “the hood,” and was facilitated in a gang. Hailey also tells Starr how she is not threatened by her because she is different from the others. Discrimination could have happened off-screen as well in terms of casting. According to Tianna Dowie-Chin, a researcher on black feminism, race, and ethnicity, wrote, “Black people with lighter skin are considered to be more employable and are employed at higher rates, incarcerated and disciplined in schools at lower rates, and possess higher representation in positions as corporate executives and government official” (par. 13). There is a high possibility that the black actors’ skin tone played a vital role in casting. The majority of the black cast, including the lead, is categorized as light skin rather than dark skin. While some may say that it does not matter because they are still black, it does matter. People are still being discriminated against based on the pigment of their skin color. The more whitewashed a person’s skin is, the higher chance they have of receiving better opportunities.

There are white supremacy issues, women in film, and African Americans represented in the film. Hailey in the movie represents white supremacy. Her character is white, wealthy, and privileged. Hailey’s persona acts like she is better than the people around her and does not care how her actions affect others. She makes multiple racist remarks towards black people. For example, she refers to “fried chicken” and says that black people are threatening society. After hearing the cop’s father talk on the news about how their family has been getting hateful comments, she also says she feels bad for them. As Stephy Monisha, a graduate from Stella Maris College, wrote, “The terrible reality is that Hailey does not feel any remorse for her white supremacist attitude, and even though she misuses her privileged position by passing racist comments, she accuses Starr of being sensitive” (p. 3994). Starr is not acting sensitive, but she is defending herself and her black community.

The women in this film are well represented, but it could have been better. The mother in the movie is shown as a strong support system for her kids, but she is much more in the book. According to Tianna Dowie-Chin, a Ph.D. candidate in Curriculum and Instruction at the University of Florida, “Rather than portraying Lisa as the successful black woman she was originally written as in the novel, the version of her presented in the film denies her role in her family, particularly her financial role” (par. 12). The novel shows the mother, Lisa, as a very successful black woman with a great job that helps support her family in a big way. In the film, that part of her is unknown, which degrades the importance of her character.

Just because this film represents the black community and a dominant black cast is shown, there are still details in the editing and cinematography that belittle them. There is also a common trait for black males in film, and that is that their characters usually end up with a lousy ending. According to Jeanette Convington, an Associate Professor of School of Arts and Sciences of Sociology, wrote, “The more savagely young black males were depicted in these films, the more moral license the criminal justice system required to arrest, imprison or kill off the dangerous black youth depicted on screen, even if it meant violating their rights in the process” (p. 64). The film does kill off a young black male that poses a threat to some people in the film. The film killed off this killer to make a point and not because it was the character’s fate. There also seems to be some noticeable edits during filming when the screen only showed black characters. For example, there are some shots in the film that when there are only black characters in the frame, the camera tends to be less stable and shakier compared to scenes with white characters (01:58:41-02:01:33). There also seems to be a trend throughout the film where many scenes involving Starr, her family, and other people in her black community are shot in the evening and night time. This results in darker lighting and gives a more suspenseful feeling. When Starr is at school or her friend’s house, they are shot during daytime and have more bright lighting (01:16:36-01:19:50). There are also shots of white actors with a camera angle looking up at them which codes as that white people are more important and powerful. An example of this is when Starr and her boyfriend, Chris, are at her locker talking and the camera looks up at Chris and eye-level for Starr (00:10:10-00:11:17). All of these issues are well exhibited throughout the film.

One aspect of this film that I focused on was the music. Music in films and shows can provide an emotional element of the event that is occurring. In this film, the music matches with the events and themes of the scenes. For example, during a party in Starr’s neighborhood, the people at the party were all African-American, drinking and dancing, so the music choice was hip/hop. The songs in this film came from artists such as Tupac, Kendrick Lamar, Pusha T, Logic, and others. In particular, though, two songs were made for the movie “The Hate U Give” by Bobby Sessions and “We Won’t Move” by Arlissa. According to Jon Burlingame, the nation’s leading writer for music in film, Bobby Sessions said, “I hope the song, along with the film, will inspire young people to find their voice, speak out, and have these uncomfortable conversations about what’s going on in our community, and hopefully motivate everyone to do something about it” (par. 8). This song is tied to the movie by having the same title and the message both outlets are trying to send to the audience. Arlissa’s song plays at the end of the movie and has compelling verses. According to Carita Rizzo, a writing and editing consultant and contractor, the song’s title’s message is saying, “We’re going to hold out ground, we’re going to remain peaceful but vigilant” (par. 4). The song itself conveys a message and emotion that has excellent chemistry with the scene of the movie. There is also instrumental music that is very strong for one particular scene. The song “The Cycle” by Dustin O’Halloran plays during the scene where Starr’s little brother is pointing their father’s gun at two gang members, and police show up to the scene. Starr realizes that her brother is very likely to be the next victim of police brutality in this event. The song has a slow tempo with a tone of sadness and worry that gives off a very emotional feel for the audience when viewing this scene. Without this particular music in this scene, the audience would not feel the same type of emotions. Music addition in scenes, whether with lyrics or without, gives off emotional appeals for the audience to connect with the storyline.

When I first watched this movie, it had me in tears and gave me the urge to get up and do something about America’s problem. Then when I first read this assignment, this movie immediately came to thought. The Hate U Give demonstrates America’s issues and that of difference, power, and discrimination. When this movie first came out in 2018, I did not know what I could do to eliminate the issue. Now, in 2020 there came an opportunity to show my support in the black community and the Black Lives Matter movement. I participated in peaceful protests at the Oregon capital and walked with thousands of people demanding equality. George Floyd’s murder was the last straw and sparked people to raise awareness of police brutality and racism in America. More and more cases from the past and present started to increase. Many more cases of police brutality came out of the shadows to expose corruption in society, much like in the movie with Starr’s friend and the police officers who killed him. People see a black male and suspect that he is up to no good. Judgment based on their race and sexuality is made before knowing the facts, which has led to a horrible ending for many. I would relate this film to the T.V. series 13 Reasons Why because both exhibit and bring to light difficult topics to talk about that but are in need to be talked about. 13 Reasons Why mentions drug abuse and addiction, suicide, sexual assault, homosexuality and sexuality, and bullying all are which issues in society and that of teenagers and young adults. Both The Hate U Give and 13 Reasons Why are meant to demonstrate to people how these issues are not something to talk about lightly and are significant problems for many people. Both want their viewers to see how these problems affect people differently and show that they are awful things to have to deal with, and those people should not have to go through that.

The Hate U Give demonstrates what many people of color have to go through and deal with in society. It brings emotion to viewers in ways that help you relate in a small way to how those who have experienced this issue go through. It is also a film that shows how societal beliefs and opinions of people of color affect how they are portrayed on screen through their editing and cinematography. The Hate U Give demonstrates through different film elements of difference, power, and discrimination issues presented both in reality and on film.

Burlingame, Jon. “Def jam to Release ‘The Hate U Give’ Soundtrack (EXCLUSIVE).” Variety. Web. 28 Sep. 2018. https://variety.com/2018/music/news/the-hate-u-give-soundtrack-def-jam-1202961188/. Accessed 17 Nov. 2020.

Covington, Jeanette. Crime and Racial Constructions : Cultural Misinformation about African Americans in Media and Academia, Lexington Books, 2010. ProQuest Ebook Central, https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/linnbenton-ebooks/detail.action?docID=500798. Accessed 17 Nov. 2020.

Dowie-Chin, Tianna, et al. “Whitewashing Through Film: How Educators Can Use Critical Race Media Literacy to Analyze Hollywood’s Adaptation of Angie Thomas’ The Hate U Give.” International Journal of Multicultural Education, vol. 22, no. 2, 2020, p. 129+. Gale Academic OneFile, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A637123496/AONE?u=lbcc&sid=AONE&xid=60a35c76. Accessed 17 Nov. 2020.

Kiang, Jessica. “Film Review: ‘The Hate You Give’.” Variety. Web. 8 Sep. 2018. https://variety.com/2018/film/reviews/the-hate-u-give-review-1202933118/. Accessed 10 Nov. 2020.

Monisha, Stephy P. “‘Other’ Worlds Represented in Angie Thomas’s The Hate U Give.” Journal of Critical Reviews 7.13 (2020), 3993-3995. Print. doi:10.31838/jcr.07.13.604

http://www.jcreview.com/fulltext/197-1599475602.pdf?1605653310. Accessed 17 Nov. 2020.

Rizzo, Carita.“‘The Hate U Give’: How Music Producers Created a Song to Amplify the Battle Against Racial Injustice.” The Hollywood Reporter. Web. 12 Dec. 2018. https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/hate-u-give-how-music-producers-created-films-final-song-1167901. Accessed 17 Nov. 2020.

The Hate U Give. Directed by George Tillman Jr., 20th Century Studios, 2018.

Difference, Power, and Discrimination in Film and Media: Student Essays Copyright © by Students at Linn-Benton Community College is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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“The Hate U Give,” Reviewed: An Empathetic, Nuanced Portrait of a Teen’s Political Awakening

By Richard Brody

There’s no special merit to films that address subjects of urgent political concern, nor to ones that advocate progressive views. Sometimes such movies offer little more than fan service, of a sort that hardly differs from canonical interpretations of superhero stories designed to please hardcore followers. In skewing their drama and characters in order to stoke viewers’ responses in favor of one particular outcome, some political movies dull the emotional experience of watching. Far from advancing and reinforcing the desired view, such numbing movies suggest that the view exacts a price in vitality; viewers will decide for themselves whether the trade-off is worth it. What’s certain is that a narrow view of advocacy and a narrowed emotional range go hand in hand, and that filmmakers, in the grip of their own persuasion, often miss that connection.

“The Hate U Give,” which is in wide release this Friday, does not fall into this trap. It’s an explicitly political movie that advocates a manifestly progressive view of its subjects, but it does so with a varied emotional energy, a set of complex characters in uncertain situations, and a perspective that emphasizes the drama’s open-ended, trouble-filled engagement with society at large. It does so with a sense of balance, of heads-up alertness that suggests a dramatic type of peripheral vision—the director, George Tillman, Jr., seems to know, and to convey that when the camera is on one character or several others are present and potent, whether just out of frame or somewhere out of view but clearly exerting an unseen influence.

It’s the story of a black family living in the predominantly black Georgia neighborhood of Garden Heights and confronting, directly and personally, legally enforced and socially reinforced norms of racism—which is to say, they’re a perfectly ordinary black American family, working and living under circumstances that, as is clear from the start, would be inconceivable for a white family to face. The central character, Starr Carter (Amandla Stenberg), a sixteen-year-old high-school student, is also the movie’s central consciousness—her presence, her conflicts, and her voice (in the form of a retrospective voice-over) dominate the film from beginning to end. The movie, based on a novel by Angie Thomas , with a screenplay by Audrey Wells (who died earlier this month), opens with Starr’s recollection of “the talk” that her father, Maverick (Russell Hornsby), gave her and her two siblings—about how to behave if stopped by a police officer, in order not to give the officer any excuse to shoot them.

Starr was nine at the time. Her half brother was ten, and his very name, Seven, is relevant to the story’s premise: he was named by Maverick in reference to point No. 7 of the Black Panthers’ Ten-Point Program, which demanded “an immediate end to police brutality and murder of black people,” and it’s precisely the police murder of a black person on which the drama of “The Hate U Give” pivots. Maverick, who owns a convenience store, and Starr’s mother, Lisa (Regina Hall), a nurse at a local hospital, arrange for Starr to attend a well-funded, predominantly white high school in a nearby community. (Starr describes the “two versions” of herself—Version One, which is her in her own neighborhood, and Version Two, which she puts forward in her school in order not to be considered “ghetto.”)

Starr Version One goes to a party with black friends in her neighborhood; when shots ring out, one of them, a young man named Khalil (Algee Smith), a lifelong friend, brings her to safety and drives her home. But during a routine traffic stop—ostensibly for a failure to signal a lane change but actually a case of a white cop catching Khalil “driving while black”—he reaches for his hairbrush, which the officer claims to believe is a gun, and shoots Khalil dead. Starr, the only witness, had started recording the arrest on her phone; ordered to put it away, she nonetheless is able to identify the officer by his badge number.

When a grand jury is convened to consider charges against the officer, Starr is asked by an attorney for Khalil’s family named April Ofrah (Issa Rae) to testify. But, as Starr knows, Khalil had been a newbie small-time drug dealer (because his family faced a catastrophic failure of the safety net) and was working for a local kingpin named King (Anthony Mackie), who pressures—and threatens—her not to testify. What’s more, Starr also faces pressure from the local police and their allies not to testify. To complicate matters, Maverick is King’s former “right-hand man.” He served three years in jail for a crime committed by King—the deal being that, after his release, he’d be released from the gang. Maverick wants Starr to testify; Lisa, however, who fears King’s gang (the King Lords), as well as the police, wants to protect Starr above all, and to keep her from testifying.

The drama is sharply delineated, the conflict clearly drawn—but Wells’s script sets them in motion by means of a wide array of complicating subplots and contextualizing incidents, which Tillman balances nimbly, energetically, and perceptively. There’s Starr’s relationship with Chris (K. J. Apa), her boyfriend, a white classmate; her friendships with other classmates, white and Asian; her relationships with her younger brother, Sekani (TJ Wright), with Seven (Lamar Johnson), and with Seven’s other half sister, Kenya (Dominque Fishback); her relationship with her uncle, Carlos (Common), who’s a police officer; and there’s the media factor, which plays a role in all of these relationships. The killing of Khalil is major local news, widely reported on television—though, because she is a minor, Starr’s identity is concealed, including from her friends.

What’s more, these media accounts are themselves a defining aspect of the movie’s societal landscape: the depiction of Khalil, the obsession with his criminal behavior, the depiction of his family, the depiction of protests that erupt after his killing, the representation of the Garden Heights community, the questions posed in interviews by a Barbie-like TV reporter are all implicated in the story. Similarly, attempts by the police to prevent residents from recording officers’ actions are also elements of the drama; so is the oppressive prevalence of gun violence on the part of the drug-dealing gang and the endemic, menacing presence of guns in the homes of law-abiding citizens as well; so is local activism, the urgency of protest, and police repression of it.

There’s also a plethora of social context in the film, regarding both Starr’s personal and familial backstory and the political framework within which Maverick is raising the family. (He instills his children with political ideals by way of a quasi-military but nonthreatening discipline.) Lisa—who nonetheless shares Maverick’s larger ideals—inculcates in the children a practical and fundamentally apolitical route to success. Despite Starr’s painful efforts to meet the unfair expectations of her white classmates, she meets with a wide range of uncomprehending judgments ranging from oblivious to insidious. The vectors of frustration, rage, and despair that rack the black residents of Garden Heights are echoed, wrongly and prejudicially, in the media in ways that only aggravate the hostility that the residents face.

The very title of the film, borrowed from the late Tupac Shakur’s explanation of his album titled “Thug Life”—The Hate U Give Little Infants Fucks Everybody—highlights the cycle of damage caused by racism. The phrase, like the film, unambiguously asserts that racist practices and attitudes, whether official or merely habitual, are the underlying engine of the movie’s very action. The movie isn’t a bold or bracing work of stylistic originality; rather, it’s one in which a familiar manner is expanded and elevated by way of insight and sensibility. “The Hate U Give” is the rare movie that puts the background into the foreground—that integrates its characters’ personal struggles and dreams with a wide and clearly observed political and historical environment. Its unstinting vigor and empathetic but unsentimental nuance mark it as a distinctive and exceptional political film.

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The Hate U Give

Starr witnesses the fatal shooting of her childhood best friend Khalil at the hands of a police officer. Now, facing pressure from all sides of the community, Starr must find her voice and s... Read all Starr witnesses the fatal shooting of her childhood best friend Khalil at the hands of a police officer. Now, facing pressure from all sides of the community, Starr must find her voice and stand up for what's right. Starr witnesses the fatal shooting of her childhood best friend Khalil at the hands of a police officer. Now, facing pressure from all sides of the community, Starr must find her voice and stand up for what's right.

• George Tillman Jr.
• Audrey Wells
• Angie Thomas
• Amandla Stenberg
• Regina Hall
• Russell Hornsby
• 412 User reviews
• 179 Critic reviews
• 81 Metascore
• 22 wins & 38 nominations

• Starr Carter

• Lisa Carter

• Maverick 'Mav' Carter

• April Ofrah

• Seven Carter

• Miss Rosalie

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• Trivia On February 5, 2018, it was announced that Kian Lawley had been fired from the film due to a resurfaced video showing him using racially offensive slurs. On April 3, 2018, it was announced that K.J. Apa had been cast to replace him. Therefore, some scenes had to be re-shot.
• Goofs When the girls were riding with King in his car, the speedometer and RPM tachometer were clearly visible in backseat view shots of King driving. The RPM tachometer would fluctuate up and down like normal driving, but the speedometer never went higher than zero to three MPH, clearly a sign that the actor was accelerating the gas pedal (while in neutral), but the car was being pulled or pushed for the interior shots.

Maverick 'Mav' Carter : [from the trailer] I didn't name you Starr by accident.

• Crazy credits At the beginning and the end of the movie, the title is shown with the letters T, H, U and G visible.
• Connections Featured in CTV News at Six Toronto: Episode dated 5 September 2018 (2018)
• Soundtracks Hold You Down Written by J Buttah, Emanny Salgado and Jadakiss Performed by Jadakiss featuring Emanny Courtesy of Def Jam Recordings Under license from Universal Music Enterprises

User reviews 412

• ashley_walton
• Oct 3, 2019
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• October 19, 2018 (United States)
• United States
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• Atlanta, Georgia, USA
• Fox 2000 Pictures
• State Street Pictures
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• $23,000,000 (estimated)
• $29,719,483
• Oct 7, 2018
• $34,934,009

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• Runtime 2 hours 13 minutes
• Dolby Digital

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Davis, California

Amandla Stenberg movie focuses on self-love, racial politics

Amandla Stenberg, the actress from “The Hunger Games” and “Everything, Everything,” is back in theaters to teach about the hardships that marginalized communities face in their day-to-day lives. “The Hate U Give, ” based on the novel by Angie Thomas, starts off with a family of five having the talk, but not the one with the birds and the bees. This talk was about what to do when a cop pulls you over, a conversation that many black households have to have in an increasingly polarized world. The movie started off strong and ended with a shocking twist.

“The Hate U Give” follows Starr Carter, played by Amandla Stenberg, who is caught between two worlds. But when Starr witnesses the unfortunate reality that far too many black families have had to face in this society, a ripple in her world is created. Starr is in the car with her childhood best friend Khalil, played by Algee Smith, when a white cop shoots him. This moment sparks a debate within Starr on whether or not she is strong enough to fight and speak up for her best friend, who can no longer speak up for himself.

Khalil’s death makes Starr doubt her day-to-day routine of code switching. Due to the drastic contrast between her two communities, Starr often employs code switching to fit in. Depending on who she’s with, Starr dresses differently, acts differently and uses different language. During one of Stenberg’s interviews, she addressed the reality of code switching in black communities.

“[Black kids] have to be so careful about the way they act and present themselves from such an early age because they understand that they are not afforded a childhood in the way their white counterparts are,” Stenberg told Trevor Noah during an interview on “The Daily Show.”

During the movie, Starr’s narrative represents the all-too-real struggle of stereotyping and double standards faced by marginalized communities. Slang that makes white people look cooler has the opposite effect on her and she is instead labeled “ghetto.” She is also careful to avoid any type of retaliation in fear of being labeled the angry black woman. Starr uses code switching in order to avoid the stereotype that is ultimately placed on her, just as it is placed on so many African Americans every day.

The movie sheds light on many different problems that the black community faces, problems which are relevant and need to be talked about. The most prevalent issues depicted were police brutality and the unjust legal system which disproportionately criminalizes African Americans and other marginalized communities. The movie expands on the definition of racism and explains that racism is ingrained so deeply into society that it is commonplace.

“The Hate U Give” repeatedly references Tupac’s song “THUG LIFE,” which stands for  “the hate you give little infants f*** everybody.” This reference consistently ties into the movie’s theme. Starr comes to the conclusion that it isn’t the hate you give infants, but the love you show that is much more powerful.

Much like Starr, Amandla Stenberg is a profound activist that is currently using her platform on social media to encourage others to educate themselves on certain topics, such as racism and homophobia, that are currently affecting the country. Her acting allowed the audience to connect with these issues on a more emotional level.

When the original cast was announced, there was concern over whether or not Stenberg should play Starr due to the fact that she is a light-skinned black woman and the book cover showed a dark skinned black woman. Stenberg took a step back and evaluated whether or not the role was hers to play. The author of the novel, Angie Thomas, spoke on a panel at the 2018 Essence film festival and stated that Amandla was the person she pictured Starr to be, settling the issue.

“The Hate U Give” is a refreshing movie. It discusses heavy topics and provides a new perspective on systemic racism within our society. “The Hate U Give” is currently playing at Regal Davis Holiday 6.

Written by: Itzelth Gamboa — [email protected]

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Led by a breakout turn from Amandla Stenberg, the hard-hitting The Hate U Give emphatically proves the YA genre has room for much more than magic and romance.

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Racism in The Hate U Give Movie Analysis Essay

The movie The Hate U Give, directed by George Tillman Jr., is an eye-opening film written to show the brutal reality of racism and the fear that African American’s live in. Within the film, the main character Starr (played by Amandla Stenberg) lives a double life where she lives and grew up in a dangerous part of town but attends a school filled with all whites, in a safe area. The truth behind her life is hidden from her friends at school but tears her apart when she has to go home to live a life in fear after. The hate that grows larger every day in Garden Heights, becomes a life of terror. There are many different emotions throughout this film that represent the feelings of what it is like to grow up with more melanin in your skin and the hate that is given to them, deserved or not. 

For the plot of this film, a teen girl named Starr is torn between two different sides of town or in this case seems to be a life torn between two completely different worlds. The primary plot choice that the film director created was a discovery. Throughout the film, the characters are learning how hate is tearing their lives apart, they do not realize how much hate is impacting the minds of the younger children until later on in the film. Starr attends school in a predominantly white, wealthy area, but lives in a predominantly black, poor area. The film shows how the hate you give out, will soon come back to you. The hatred towards not only African Americans but other people in the area that Starr grew up grows out of control. It gets to the point where they are not safe in their homes, public, church, or even at a funeral. In the life of Starr, the two polar opposite worlds get flipped upside-down when a white police officer shoots her best friend, Khalil, after being pulled over on the side of the road. Her separate lives get mixed as the news is broadcasted and protests began and she can no longer contain her emotions. Starr has to hide what she feels from her friends on the nicer side of town so that she is not judged, but the anger and fear overpower her. She must speak out and she must be a better friend to Khalil. The young girl uses her voice as a stance for stopping the hate that is given towards African Americans. 

Throughout the film, there are many different forms of symbolism to show the pain and hardships that are brought onto blacks because of racism and hate. As a child gets older, they become more aware of discrimination and hate and they also absorb how they see others being treated. So at the youngest age of one, Starr and her siblings were given “the talk” as soon as possible. The talk is a conversation that should not have to be a factor in someone’s life, but sadly in this society, it is a must. The talk is given to Starr and her siblings in the film to teach them how they should act if they are to be arrested or pulled over by a cop. These precautions are simple, but life-changing to people of color due to discrimination by cops and other white people. The first symbol that the film creator chooses to represent the struggle that Blacks have to go through was the black panther. The black panther was a list of rights that the children must embed into their tiny brains and remember in every situation. Towards the beginning of the film, Starr is shown as a little girl who is getting “the talk” from her father, Maverick (played by Russell Hornsby) on how important it is to know her rights. Starr remembers these rights throughout the film and uses them to save her father’s life, even if she was told she did not have them when her best friend was shot. The author uses the image of a black panther on a piece of paper to show how people of color must know their rights, stick together, and be aware of their surroundings. The panther symbolizes a group, almost as if Blacks are in their category. 

There are many other uses of symbolism within this move such as a hairbrush. The hairbrush that was mistaken as a gun by the Cop in the film, took Khalil’s life. The hairbrush symbolizes the wrongfulness in the murder of Khalil. It represents the carelessness and racism that the cop had towards Khalil. As said in the film, if it were a white person in a business suit holding the hairbrush, the cop would have asked them to raise their hands above their heads, not shoot them in the chest. The hairbrush is a subtle yet powerful form of the symbolism of racism in this film. Khalil did not have a weapon, he barely had a reason to be pulled over, and he did not use force against the cop, but he still was killed. The officer did not know what Khalil had in his hand at the time, but he knew he was black and he saw the color of Khalil’s skin as a threat. The hairbrush was a symbol that was used multiple times to show how quick the cop was to stereotype Khalil. It is used again by Starr to teach her “best friend” at Williamson Prep a lesson. Grabbing the hairbrush and swinging it at Hailey (played by Sabrina Carpenter), Starr tried to show how poor it was for the cop to take Khalil’s life over something that cannot harm. The hairbrush was a symbol of the senselessness of the cop who took Khalil’s life. 

Symbolism is used throughout the entire film and the list could go on, but one other major form of symbolism in this film is a gun. A gun has the ability to kill more than any other weapon. A gun is carried by most people who live in the heights, where they lived in the movie. A gun is the last thing Khalil sees and the first thing Starr sees when she shuts her eyes. A gun is an issue in their society. 

From the first gunshots taken at the party, to the gun shaking in Sekani’s hand, a gunshot becomes a norm in their lives. It seems as though they cannot have fun or even through a get-together, without someone being shot at or killed. In a life filled with hate, white or black, cop or no cop, a gun is seen as the way to solve a problem. We all know that having a gun pointed towards your face even once in your life is not okay, but it becomes the norm for blacks living in their area. This form of symbolism shows not only racism and targetting but shows how different Starr grows up on each end of town. 

The theme of this movie is hate. Hate changes their town and turns their entire community against each other. Not only is the hate coming from within their “own people”, but it is also coming from whites, cops, and the people on the other side of town. It comes to a point where hate is all that is known. Where discrimination, fighting, protesting, and running are a constant in their lives. Hate is spread down on every person who sees it. Just like the little boy, Sekani, who watched people hate each other every day to the point that it broke him enough to pick up a gun at the age of eight years old and point it towards someone. He wanted to end hate, not end someone’s life. As the title says, The Hate U Give little infants fucks everybody. Also known as THUG LIFE. Growing up in a society where there is nothing but hate towards others rather it is because of their color of skin or they turned their back on you, changes the way you look at life. The author chose this theme because it covers many different aspects of hate, white, black, authority, and even gangs. Nothing is worse than teaching hate to a child. It creates a vicious cycle of envy.  

To conclude, the Hate U Give is a powerful movie that brings awareness to the issue of racism and targeting towards people of color. The film creator used different forms of symbolism to bring a sense of the brutal reality that Blacks face every day. The fear of color shows more about a person than the pigment of one’s skin and this was shown throughout the film. Just like the famous saying “never judge a book by its color”, the movie shows the cruel discrimination against judging a person by the pigment of their skin. The theme of hate throughout this movie ties the whole thing together with the slogan “The hate you give little infants fucks everybody” as the characters watch the eight-year-old little boy point a gun at the man, threatening to end his life for the damage he had caused their family. Stereotypes create the tunnel vision effect of what an innocent person looks like and is the reason that Blacks are treated differently by many. This film brings a chill down your spine and opens your eyes to reality as the heartwrenching actions against African Americans take place. Hate creates a world of stereotypes and discrimination; Hate creates a life filled with fear for African Americans.

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The Hate U Give: The major book-to-movie differences explained by Angie Thomas and George Tillman Jr.

The hate u give : the major book-to-movie differences.

The Hate U Give is not an unfaithful adaptation, but no matter how closely a film mirrors its origin book, a few changes must always be made. As Angie Thomas , author of the New York Times best-selling YA novel , tells EW, she thinks of the book and movie as fraternal twins.

"I remind my readers that these are two separate mediums," she explains. "They share the same DNA and that's what truly matters."

Read on to find out how Thomas and the film's director, George Tillman Jr. ( Notorious ), reworked the story to fit the big screen.

The opening scene

The film begins with a flashback. The Carter family sits around the table as Maverick ( Russell Hornsby ) explains to a young Starr (Kai Ture) and Seven (Hassan Welch) what no child should have to hear: What to do when they get stopped by the police. In the book, that comes much later.

"When I saw one of the first drafts of the script, and it opened with that scene of the family I was like 'Maybe we should start the book out that way, too,'" laughs Thomas. "Because I was still editing the book. There's a deleted version of the book where it starts with that scene; it didn't work for us, but for the film it gave us this very important background scene for the character, and it informs so much of what she does and how she reacts later on. We see Starr at such a young age; 7 is such a young age to be involved in this very adult conversation. And what does that mean when so often young black kids have to get this talk and are forced out of their innocence into a world that so often sees them as a threat?"

The Carter family backstory

In the novel, readers become incredibly familiar with the history of Maverick and Lisa's relationship: The infidelity, the breakup, the jail sentence. The film had to portray those same sentiments without the benefit of a few hundred pages to lay it all out.

"I wanted to show the nuances of their relationship in terms of their love for one another, their sensuality, their sense of leadership, and their differences," says Tillman Jr. "Especially in terms of Lisa [ Regina Hall ] wanting to move out of the neighborhood and Mav wanted to stay—all those things gave us a complexity that we don't really see with a mother and father relationship of African-American descent. A little bit [of plot] here and there just gave us those nuances: Obviously the three years they spent in prison [were] talked about, and the relationship with Carlos [ Common ], but it's those small things that I saw my mother and father do that help us believe in the love and believe that these two are trying not to make the same mistakes they made in the past."

The YA romance

As readers might point out, there are a few intimate moments that don't quite make it to the big screen.

"With YA books there's honestly no limit with what you can do, it's just about how you do it," says Thomas. "I've read YA books with a lot of sex scenes in them that address how teenagers are dealing with sexuality; I've read very graphic YA books. So often the problem is not the books themselves, but the adults [acting as] gatekeepers [who] don't want kids to read those books, or they think that teenagers aren't dealing with these things when they are."

Language, language, language

The inspiration for the title itself comes with a cinematic sticking point: Tupac 's philosophy of THUG LIFE, which he said stood for The Hate U Give Little Infants F--- Everybody.

"In terms of the language I was trying to be really true and I really thank the MPAA [Motion Picture Association of America], they were very helpful in this," explains Tillman Jr. "You get an R rating if you use two effs, so I always had one eff in the whole film and when I got down to finish the film it just didn't feel right that Starr cannot say f--- in describing the Tupac philosophy. So we went back in and we told the MPAA that it was going to be humorous to an audience if we don't finish the word the second time around. Khalil says it and then Starr comes back with just 'eff.' So the MPAA wrote us back and granted us a PG-13 with two effs because they believed in the movie and they totally [understood]."

The residents of Garden Heights

Some of the more enjoyable aspects of the book are the anecdotes of all the community members: Lisa checking on the older residents, Fo'ty Ounce entertaining the whole block. Several of these characters (and we mean that in every sense of the word) are notably absent on the big screen.

"It was more about keeping the mood and the vibe of the neighborhood [instead of individual residents]," notes Tillman Jr. "I was very excited about the neighborhood because where I grew up in the '80s and '90s, the community was such a big part of our neighborhood. We had the store owner, the barber shop, the church, and it was this village that raised us. When I started the script development stage it felt like it was hard to maintain so many of those characters, so we just put it into Mr. Lewis and the barbecue joint, which was very important to us. But the spirit was still there—like at the very end when everyone's standing around Mav's store, when King's [saying], 'I see your store's doing good,' we see people coming into the store or Mav working in there. I thought all that was important in capturing the vibe of what Angie put in the book."

DeVante and Seven are kind of the same person

Okay, so that's a bit of an exaggeration. But as many people have noticed, there is no DeVante in the movie—a character whose journey was a big part of the novel. Instead, the screenwriters folded a few of his plot points into Seven's (Lamar Johnson) story line.

"When they first told me they were cutting DeVante, my gut instinct was, 'No, you can't!'" laughs Thomas. "But then when George explained that it would take away from Starr, I understood. So, for me, it really was about just letting go and being okay with things because as long as the heart of the story was there—and the plot was still there—that's what matters. Honestly, I've seen the movie several times now and I don't miss DeVante or Nana, you know? And for a second I was like, 'Dang, does this mean I shouldn't have put them in the book?'"

Sekani and the gun

There are several dramatic standoffs with the police in Garden Heights, but the film's climax comes during a moment with young Sekani (TJ Wright)—a scene that wasn't in the novel.

"I think the scene with Sekani, instead of a dramatization, it was more explaining the philosophy of Tupac with a visual effect," says Tillman Jr. "Outside of the community, a lot of people might not know Tupac's music so it [became], how do you explain it? That's the part of the adaptation where I think the filmmaker and writer [are] able to bring more to the table and bring an extra layer. I noticed in the book that Sekani is there, taking in everything, and then King is there and everything kind of comes together. I tried to stay away from overdramatizing—it becomes almost cliché—I tried to make it more honest."

The move from Garden Heights

In both mediums, the story ends on a hopeful note, but in the book that note involves the family moving out of Garden Heights into a bigger, nicer house.

"When we started testing the movie, a lot of people [asked], 'Was there a reason why they moved? Or is there a reason why they couldn't stay?'" says Tillman Jr. "Sometimes when you're making a movie, the movie tells you what to do and the movie was telling me that the family should stay at that time. And I talked to Angie about it and she was okay with that. I think sometimes in the community that can be a good decision—I remember we moved out of the neighborhood and it helped me so much. But, a lot of my family and my cousins stayed in the neighborhood and it helped them so much."

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The Hate U Give: Differences Between the Book and the Movie

Charting how The Hate U Give book differs from the movie - changes to characters, a different ending and more.

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This article comes from Den of Geek UK .

Massive spoilers for the book and film lie ahead…

Film adaptations of books almost always differ from the source material to some extent – they’re two different types of storytelling if nothing else. Angie Thomas’ powerful YA novel The Hate U Give follows African American teenager Starr, who lives in the hard up and predominantly black neighborhood of Garden Heights, while struggling to keep her identity at the posh and predominantly white high school she attends. When she witnesses a police shooting Starr has to find her own voice, and deal with the costs of speaking out.

The film, directed by George Tillman Jr., is out now; it’s a powerful adaptation which stays true to the heart of the book. However, there are some significant changes and omissions there too. Here are all the ways the movie differs from the book.

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The character of Starr’s boyfriend is roundly the same but the argument post- the condom thing is prolonged in the book. The slightly uncomfortable ‘I don’t see color’ speech in the film isn’t in the book either, though he does express a similar sentiment towards the end of the novel. When Starr and Seven question him about food in the book it’s green bean casserole, while in the film it’s sweet potato pie versus pumpkin pie. It’s still the merits and properties of macaroni cheese they ultimately disagree on in both the book and the film.

In the novel, Mr Lewis is the grouchy owner of the Barbershop next to the store that Starr’s dad Maverick owns. He’s not a big part in the film, though he notices Starr and Seven are in the store when it’s on fire. In the book he has a more significant role. After Khalil is killed there are various protests in Garden Heights; this includes an attack on a police car which Mr Lewis says he witnesses. Lewis speaks to a news crew live on TV and specifically identifies King as a drug dealer, and the King Lords as a violent gang. Lewis calls out Maverick, who used to be a King Lord, for sticking to stupid rules about not snitching and for teaching his kids to do the same. He shows him the prosthetic leg he has after losing a leg in the war and a scar he has after being cut by some white guys for drinking from ‘their’ fountain. It’s this argument that causes the police to wrestle Mav to the ground in front of his children and identify that Starr was the witness to Khalil’s murder (and not a row with King, as was the catalyst in the movie). Lewis is later beaten up by King’s gang. At the end Mr Lewis gives Mav his shop after that and Mav’s store are burned down; his only stipulation is that Mav puts a picture of Martin Luther King in there.

In the film DeVante appears only very briefly – he’s the guy at the party at the start chatting up a girl called Denasia, who Starr’s friend Kenya wants to beat up. In the book though, DeVante is a key part of the plot. It turns out DeVante is a King Lord too. At the party at the start of the story Starr and Khalil leave because they hear shots – it turns out those shots were fired by rival gang the Garden Disciples and they result in the death of DeVante’s brother Dalvin. King wants DeVante to carry out a retaliation attack. DeVante steals thousands of dollars from King to pay for his mother and family to leave town (because if he gets into a revenge war with the Garden Disciples it puts his family in danger). DeVante then decides not to retaliate but his mother puts him out of the house anyway. DeVante is hiding from King in Mav’s store and Mav decides to protect him. DeVante works in Mav’s store and is taken to live with Uncle Carlos. It’s DeVante who’s beaten up by King (in the movie it’s Seven), and he’s with Seven, Starr and Chris at the protests and agrees to be a witness against King at the end.

Uncle Carlos

Cop Carlos appears in the film – played by Common (perfect casting). In the book he’s a bigger part and an influence on Starr. Carlos is very close to Starr, having spent a lot of time with her while Mav was in prison. Carlos puts up DeVante and there’s a sense that he’s helping DeVante because he feels like he let Khalil down. Various members of Starr’s family stay with him – Sekani’s bike lives at Carlos’ house because it’s not safe to ride in Garden Heights. Carlos also lives close to Starr’s boyfriend Chris, so Carlos and his wife know about the relationship while Mav does not. The conversation between Starr and Carlos about when police shoot and when they say ‘put up your hands’ isn’t quite the same in the book. In the book Carlos concludes that he wouldn’t have shot Khalil.

Unsurprisingly the film is slightly more diplomatic in how the police are portrayed, and the riots are a little more PG-13. In the film Starr and her friends don’t repeatedly chant ‘fuck the police’ as they do in the book, for example…

Perhaps it’s the casting of lovely Anthony Mackie in the role of King in the film, but this character is also more sympathetically portrayed. King in the book is vile, gross, and abusive. He’s essentially a pimp to Iesha – in the film Mav slept with Iesha and got her pregnant with Seven when Mav and Lisa had broken up. In the film Mav sleeps with Iesha after a row with Lisa because King basically treats her as a prostitute. King beats Iesha, Lewis and DeVante and threatens Mav and Starr. In the movie he’s mildly redeemable at the start. Not in the book.

Hailee and Maya

Starr’s Williamson friends have a bigger role in the book than the movie. Their roles are similar, though in the book Maya is explicitly Asian-American and Hailee has also made racist remarks towards her. Hailee is racist in both and at the end of the book Starr texts her essentially ending their friendship.

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Khalil, drugs, and his mom

Khalil is also perfectly cast in the film, embodied by the highly charismatic Algee Smith. In the film Starr and Khalil kiss on the night of his death, in the book there’s sexual tension but they don’t kiss. Starr knows that Khalil is a drug dealer in both, but in the book his reasons for selling drugs and involvement with the King Lords isn’t revealed to Starr (or us) until later in the narrative. Khalil’s mother is an addict and his grandmother has cancer. Khalil’s mother is in debt to King so Khalil’s is dealing to try to protect her. King tries to recruit Khalil into the King Lords but Khalil refuses. At the funeral in the book, King lays a gray bandana on Khalil’s corpse claiming him as part of his gang, but Starr later finds out this is just for show.

One of the biggest changes from the book is the ending. In the movie a stand-off between King, Mav and the police, after King has set fire to Maverick’s store, escalates when little Sekani takes Maverick’s gun and points it at King. Are the police really going to shoot a little child? Is King? Is Sekani really going to shoot King? It’s a tense ending, if a bit literal about the ‘little infants’ element of the ‘Thug Life’ meaning that the title is derived from (‘The Hate U Give Little Infants Fucks Everyone’). Sekani does not get shot and does not shoot King and the police are able to arrest King for arson. In the book King and his gang are hanging around after the fire laughing about it. When the police and fire brigade show up Mr Lewis tells them King set the fire, but he denies it. Maverick decides to speak up too and says King did it, and the rest of the community back him up and say they saw King light the fire. King is arrested but the family knows he’s likely to get out on bail after a short time and come for revenge. Instead though, DeVante agrees to disclose where King’s stash of drugs is and work with Uncle Carlos as a police witness to get him put away for a long time. Carlos offers him protection. Mr Lewis gives Mav his store and Mav agrees to rebuild it, and bring something positive to their community.

Read and download the Den of Geek NYCC 2018 Special Edition Magazine right here!

Rosie Fletcher

Rosie Fletcher is Co-Editor-in-Chief of Den Of Geek. She’s been an entertainment journalist for more than 15 years previously working at DVD & Blu-ray Review, Digital…

The Hate U Give (2018 film)

By george tillman jr., the hate u give (2018 film) themes.

The title of the movie alludes to this important theme. The title refers to Tupac's anagram for "Thug Life": "The hate you give little infants fucks everybody." This quote alludes to the fact that the hate black youth experience from white society only creates a cycle of hate, which is the structural motor for why black Americans get caught up in systems of violence and crime. The film examines one family's attempts at breaking the cycle of this hate, and finding a way to protest and fight injustice in ways that are self-affirming and loving. Hate, according to the movie, is a dead end that ruins everyone's lives.

Social Inequality

The imagery of Williamson, the prep school Starr attends, and Garden Heights, the neighborhood where she lives, reveals a stark division between the rich and poor, between black and white communities. Starr exists in the middle between this divide, forced to adopt two selves in order to fit in. The film shows how this social inequality affects people differently. For instance, for the white students at Williamson, a protest is a good excuse to skip class, but for Starr, it is the only thing that makes her feel empowered to seek justice in the wake of her friend's murder.

Police Brutality and Injustice

This is a recurring theme throughout the movie, and appears from the start, when Maverick makes his young children recite the Ten-Point Program from the Black Panther Party. When Khalil is wrongfully shot to death by a white officer, the film delves deeper into an exploration of the injustice black individuals suffer at the hands of ignorant and trigger-happy white officers. The police force depicted in the film is a violent, proto-fascist, and unsympathetic institution. They break up a peaceful protest with tear gas and they are quick to pull a gun on black individuals. The film gives the viewer a window into this injustice, and shows the way that police brutality gets mishandled by the media and the law.

One of Starr's main struggles is her sense that she is living a double life. On the one hand, she is a girl who grew up in a rough black neighborhood and has seen two of her friends get shot. On the other hand, she attends Williamson and dates an affluent white boy, and so integrates herself into the prep school life. The constant switching between these two personas results in immense confusion for Starr, who feels that she does not fit in in either environment. Over the course of the film, she learns that the only way to feel better about herself is to be more honest about her identity and integrate these two sides of herself.

The one thing that Starr can count on, even when things get complicated and she feels isolated in her community, is her family. The Carters are a tight-knit group, often sharing family meals, holding each other accountable, and sharing warm laughs. Starr feels deep belonging with her family, and while they do not always see eye-to-eye, she knows she can rely on them when the going gets tough. They do their best to keep her safe and take care of her, but her parents forgive and respect her when she strikes out on her own and tries to establish her independence.

Finding Your Voice

Starr is hesitant about speaking up about Khalil's death, worried about the attention that it will bring her, including possible repercussions from the vengeful King Lord. She holds back—until one day, she decides that she has an obligation to speak up. She speaks on television and testifies in front of the grand jury. The true test of her desire to speak up, however, comes after the jury fails to indict the white officer, and the community of Garden Heights starts protesting. Starr joins the front lines of the protest, and even makes an impassioned speech into a megaphone about her experience as the witness to Khalil's death, and her commitment to preserving his memory. Starr learns to trust her own voice, and her ability to speak up against oppressive powers.

One of the more heartbreaking things about Khalil's death on a personal level for Starr is the fact that he was her first love. In the moments before he got pulled over by the cop, Khalil confesses his feelings for Starr and they share a kiss. There is a warmth and affection between the two of them that makes Khalil's murder all the more shocking and horrible.

Additionally, Starr loves and is loved by Chris , a white student at her school who doesn't know about her life in Garden Heights. Eventually, after he has shown up enough times and insisted to Starr that he loves and sees her for who she is, Starr accepts his love and they embark on a loyal and meaningful relationship.

The Hate U Give (2018 film) Questions and Answers

The Question and Answer section for The Hate U Give (2018 film) is a great resource to ask questions, find answers, and discuss the novel.

Chapters 25-26

King Lord and his members laugh because they are responsible for the arson.... they have burned down Maverick's store.

How does the movie deal with racism/issues related to race?

This is a recurring theme throughout the movie, and appears from the start, when Maverick makes his young children recite the Ten-Point Program from the Black Panther Party. When Khalil is wrongfully shot to death by a white officer, the film...

what are some of the techniques used within the film?

Sorry, I have not seen the film version of the book.

Study Guide for The Hate U Give (2018 film)

The Hate U Give (2018 film) study guide contains a biography of George Tillman Jr., literature essays, quiz questions, major themes, characters, and a full summary and analysis.

• About The Hate U Give (2018 film)
• The Hate U Give (2018 film) Summary
• Character List
• Director's Influence

Wikipedia Entries for The Hate U Give (2018 film)

• Introduction

The Hate U Give

61 pages • 2 hours read

A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.

Before You Read

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapters 1-5

Chapters 6-10

Chapters 11-15

Chapters 16-19

Chapters 20-21

Chapters 22-26

Character Analysis

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Further Reading & Resources

Discussion Questions

Tupac’s THUG LIFE explanation is a major theme of the book. How do you see THUG LIFE playing out in the real world today, possibly even in your community? Can you relate any recent events to the idea of THUG LIFE?

THUG LIFE refers to the self-perpetuating cycle of hatred but does not necessarily offer a solution. How does author Angie Thomas address this? Does she offer a solution or is the answer more complicated? How do you think you can fight against this cycle?

How does this book provide a voice and a perspective that is often overlooked?

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5 tense crime movies on Prime Video with 95% or higher on Rotten Tomatoes

T he crime genre includes everything from chilling mysteries to detective work to legal thrillers. No matter what you’re in the mood for, there should be something to watch, and one of the best streaming services includes some critically acclaimed crime movies. But if you’re stuck wondering what to stream next, we have a list containing some of the most intense stories. 

Prime Video has a vast library of movies, but only a few share a high score on Rotten Tomatoes . We used this review aggregation site to determine what crime movies have scored well with audiences and critics around the world. Of course, high ratings don’t guarantee you’re going to love the movie, but they do indicate it’s worth watching. 

Our team at Tom’s Guide has chosen the top crime movies on Prime Video, from a western drama led by Chris Pine to an accidental murder. Check them out below.

'Hell or High Water'

The western crime “Hell or High Water” is a movie you should add to your list. It follows Toby (Chris Pine), a divorced father who wants to give his son the best life. He and his brother Tanner (Ben Foster) plan a final robbery against the bank threatening to close their family ranch due to outstanding debt, with hopes of keeping some of the money to give Toby's son the life he deserves. Marcus (Jeff Bridges) and Alberto (Gil Birmingham), a ranger and a lawman, will stop at nothing to prevent the robbery. This movie focuses on how people do bad things for the right reasons, even though they’re blindsided by their own motivations. 

Watch on Prime Video

'The Godfather'

“The Godfather” is considered to be one of the greatest movies of all time. Based on Mario Puzo's novel of the same name, this epic crime drama focuses on the powerful family of Don Vito Corleone (Marlon Brando). He gives control of his empire to his youngest son Michael (Al Pacino), although the boy is reluctant to join the organized crime dynasty. In the meantime, Michael tries to maintain his relationship with his wife while delving deeper into the family business and its twisted secrets.

'The Hate U Give'

Up next on the list is “The Hate U Give”, a crime thriller that focuses on how society uses the stereotypes of black people to justify racism and violence. Starr (Amandla Stenberg) lives in a poor neighborhood while attending a suburban prep school, meaning she has to live two separate lives. On one fateful day, she witnesses her childhood best friend get shot by a police officer who wrongly accused him of having a weapon. Now, she is determined to advocate against police violence and defend her best friend’s name. 

'Blood On Her Name'

“Blood On Her Name” follows the story of Leigh (Bethany Anne Lind), a single mom who accidentally kills someone and spirals into a panic. With enough trouble weighing her down, she decides to do the right thing and deliver the man’s body to his family and friends, knowing it’s the only way to please her guilty conscience. You’ll follow her on this journey, from the moment the murder takes place to the moment she plans on concealing evidence, with insights into how a broken person’s mind works. 

'Blue Ruin'

If you’re in the mood for a dark crime thriller, “Blue Ruin” should be your next watch. Dwight (Macon Blair) returns to his hometown after receiving some news about the murder of his parents. He makes it his mission to exact revenge on the murderer who escaped prison and targeted his family. The high Rotten Tomatoes score proves that “Blue Ruin” is worth experiencing due to its incredible acting and emotional storytelling. Dwight reflects raw human emotion when it comes to overcoming grief and anger. 

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