[wpdevart_youtube]3MM8OkVT0hw[/wpdevart_youtube]THE HATE U GIVE ***
Dir: George Tilman Jr. (12A, 100 mins)
Based on the hit YA novel by Angie Thomas, The Hate U Give is a timely and powerful take on racism and poverty from a teenage perspective. Amandla Stenberg plays Starr, a girl who has to deal with two different worlds. She goes to a mostly white private school on one side of the tracks but hails from a mostly black neighbourhood. Rich and poor rubbing shoulder to shoulder, privilege and prejudice. Negotiating these different racial spaces becomes her way of life, but after her best friend Khalil (Algee Smith) is shot and killed by police following a routine traffic stop, she has to make a choice about what she truly believes in, with pressures coming from all around. Violence brews as Starr becomes the centre of a Black Lives Matter protest and wants to get her voice heard. Impassioned and intelligent, with a fantastic central performance by Stenberg, The Hate U Give is an absorbing, well observed and angry drama with an urgent purpose. Opens Oct 26
