THE HATE YOU GIVE (12A)

TAKING its title from the message inked into rapper Tupac Shakur’s ‘THUG LIFE’ tattoo, George Tillman Jr’s emotionally charged drama rages against racial division and police violence in

America. The Hate U Give is sensitively adapted by Audrey Wells from Angie Thomas’s young adult novel, which chronicles the anguished rites of passage of a teenager, who finds her voice in the most tragic circumstances.

Amandla Stenberg, as Starr Carter, delivers a gut-wrenching lead performance, and zigzags uncomfortably between worlds of white privilege and black indignation. She lives in Garden Heights, Georgia, with ex-con father Maverick (Russell Hornsby), who turned his back on local drug dealer King (Anthony Mackie) to raise a family with wife Lisa (Regina Hall). Their brood includes Starr’s half-brother Seven and younger brother Sekani.

To ensure her babies have a brighter future, Lisa sends the children to the predominantly white Williamson Prep). The teenage heroine keeps the two sides of her existence separate until she witnesses a white police officer shoot her unarmed childhood friend, Khalil (Algee Smith) dead.

Racked with grief, Starr shoulders a heavy burden to speak up for the deceased. But testifying against a cop could lead to reprisals.

This doesn’t project Starr’s journey of empowerment through a rose-tinted lens. The film ripples with fury and despair but has an undercurrent of hope.