Watching it now, there’s still a great sense of the sort of power this film can have on display, even if it’s somewhat depressing to know Kassovitz could easily make this movie now and not have to really change anything.

| Original Score: 4.5/5 | May 1, 2024

It’s a portrayal of what happens when low income living, boredom, alienation, and hopelessness intersect in one powerful and explosive cinematic experience.

| Apr 22, 2024

Though some of this might seem a bit old to Americans, Kassovitz has some things of his own to say -- and he says them with nuance, feeling, and authority.

| Jul 20, 2023

As for Kassovitz, his own go-for-broke visual bravura and highly charged storytelling are so American in feel that the news that he plans his Hollywood seems inevitable.

| Jul 20, 2023

Stark, exquisite black-and-white photography drains what little cheer there is out of the concrete jungle, creating an alien cityscape devoid of sunshine. But Mathieu Kassovitz's triumph is in finding humanity in every single one of his characters.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Jul 20, 2023

Two things save La Haine from being schematic or a mere slice of life. The first is the quality of the performances... The second is the vigour and fluency of Kassovitz's script and direction.

| Jul 20, 2023

The kind of strong but narrowly focused work that might have had problems in translation. Yet for American viewers, the eeriest part of Mr. Kassovitz's precise and troubling film is how easily it reflects our own social problems.

| Jul 20, 2023

Hate, the brilliant, abrasive new film from French writer-director Mathieu Kassovitz, is all muscle and rage. From the opening shot, it punishes us with the intensity of its explosive black-and-white images.

| Jul 20, 2023

Hate is, I suppose, a Generation X film, whatever that means, but more mature and insightful than the American Gen X movies. In America, we cling to the notion that we have choice... In France, Kassovitz says, it is society that has made the choice.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jul 20, 2023

The result is a jittery, propulsive, slangy study of jeunes hommes in the hood, complete with a soundtrack of reggae and rap.

| Original Score: B | Jul 20, 2023

The strength of the film is that it neither glamorises nor patronises its characters. They hate their life because it's boring, and they despise the society that's created it for them.

| Jul 20, 2023

Hate is a blast of movie outrage, a genuine shocker.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Jul 20, 2023

What you remember most about Hate isn't its technique, but its powerhouse emotional punch: It's a stunner.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Jul 20, 2023

In this cynical age, where it seems there is precious little left to believe in, Kassovitz is a godsend, his righteous anger representing the real thing.

| Jul 20, 2023

For anyone grown weary of French cinema's bourgeois sheen, La Haine is a wonderful wake-up call. See it.

| Jul 20, 2023

Although occasionally stunning in its stylistic audacity, abrupt brutality, and inspired moments of absurdity, La Haine is kid stuff compared to its American counterparts, a tourist guide to the mean streets.

| Jul 20, 2023

The movie is powerful but irritatingly vague and fatalistic. One gets the impression that for Kassovitz, hopelessness is somehow more pure and beautiful than ambition or even the desire to survive.

| Jul 20, 2023

Hate is a grim, unsettling film with plenty to say and a fresh way of saying it.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Jul 20, 2023

Hate isn't perfect, but it's got all the right energies and feelings and is miles beyond Kassovitz's first film, Cafe au Lait, in its power, immediately, and moral authority.

| Jul 20, 2023

Rash as adolescence and urgent as its terse title, Hate is a total immersion in race and class war as played out over 24 hours in a Paris housing project.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Jul 20, 2023