19) American History X
An unflinching, powerful film, American History X examines the ways racial prejudice and hatred tear at a family, centering on a former neo-Nazi California skinhead (Edward Norton) who returns from prison reformed and tries to prevent his idolizing younger brother (Edward Furlong) from going down the same wrong path that he did.
Through black-and-white flashbacks, we are shown how Norton’s hatred spawned itself, in which he had at one time transformed into a racist murderer. Norton gives a socko, explosive, full-embodied performance in director Tony Kaye’s important film that’s very intense and brutal to watch, but hard to forget, packing an emotional powerhouse.
Thinking of the curb stomp still makes me cringe. Check it out below and see if you feel the same way.
20) Happiness
Writer-director Todd Solondz’s Happiness, his follow-up to 1996’s Welcome to the Dollhouse, is a startlingly courageous and wickedly ironic assessment of the human condition. This Robert Altman-esque tapestry of really interesting, complex characters, includes completely different sisters Joy (Jane Adams), Helen (Lara Flynn Boyle), and Trish (Cynthia Stevenson), living in the Garden State.
Each vignette is compelling and, with harsh honesty, tempered with humor. Dylan Baker somehow makes a pedophilic psychologist, who drugs his son’s friend, not only tormented but unexpectedly empathetic; his wife (perfectly played by Stevenson) is living in a all-American facade of PTA meetings. No one is especially happy, but either tell themselves they are, strive for it, and toast to it.
You want a forced happy ending? See Stepmom. It’s not a complete bummer.