NB: Unfortunately this is not my finished draft because I totally changed my idea and direction on Thursday, but hopefully this gives you an idea of what this is about.
Before I begin I would like to give a background of this piece because while it is quite famous, not many people have seen or know of its existence. The film I am rewriting is one called ‘American History X’ and I decided on this piece because of its relevance in modern times. While many texts focus on post colonial prejudices that took place hundreds of years ago, ‘American History X’ is an extremely powerful film which highlights and brings attention to racism, neo-Nazism and xenophobia in America in today’s world. It is about Derek Vinyard (played by Edward Norton) who is a self confessed member of the white power movement in Los Angeles and his younger teenage brother, Danny (Edward Furlong), who narrates the film and seems to be following in Derek’s footsteps. In the film Derek shoots and kills two black men who are trying to steal his car and it explores his three years in prison as he comes to the realisation that everything he believes is a lie as well as following his life once he is released and his mission to get Danny out of the environment he was once part of. My rewrite is an extension of the film; at the end of the movie Danny is shot and killed by a black teenager at his school, which is a sad irony as Derek has just made him realise the errors of their ways. My rewrite will focus on Derek’s future as a councillor in a juvenile prison where he works to re educate teenage boys destined to become what he was in the sense of white power movements, I will be writing in first person from Derek’s point of view. I realise that this piece and film deals with some pretty horrendous themes but I think it is important to bring an awareness to it because as sick as it is, it is part of the world and if it can be combated, the better this world would be. Also here is a link to the trailer of the film.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jXaZENPQrswAmerican Future: Derek’s Redemption
Ten Years Later
I awoke to my alarm clock yelling at me. Reaching across my body and rolling on my side, I shut the noise off and stared at the digital red 6:00 flashing back at me. The first thing that came to my mind was Danny. It has been ten years since he had been taken away from us but Danny was the always the first I thought about when got up. But I didn’t remember him as when I last saw him. I didn’t remember holding him in my arms, his body pierced with bullets, lifeless, as his blood soaked my shirt and as I screamed in agony on the bathroom floor of Venice Beach High. No, I didn’t remember him like that at all, even though that image had haunted me so many mornings before. When I awoke I remembered Danny’s cheeky grin flashing up at me, his eyes that used to dance with excitement and his laugh, oh that laugh, so infectious you couldn’t help but laugh with him even if you didn’t have a clue what was so funny. I smiled to myself as I remembered his laugh, I always did and that included the times in which I cried.
Getting up, I made my way to the bathroom for a quick shower before Ally got up. It was just us two now; Davina had moved to Washington and pursued a career with the Democrats just like we all knew she would, such a smart one that girl; and Doris? Well the smokes had finally claimed Mum, she said Danny had once told her that he would grow his hair back the day she quit smoking but Danny never got that chance. Stepping out the shower and wrapping a towel around my waist and stood on the freezing bathroom tiles and the cold shot through my body, mixing and cooling my body heat from the shower. As I stood on those tiles, I stared at my reflection through the misty, steam-filmed mirror. A Swartz sticker glared back at me from the left hand side of my chest. They had ways of removing tattoos nowadays but I would never get rid of it. It was a reminder. A reminder of who I was, who I had become and what it had cost me in the ultimate loss of my brother. All the other tattoos remained as well; the iron cross, the eagle, the words ‘white power,’ all reminders that I could not erase my past but that could better my future, my community, my world.
Ally was now the same age as Danny was when I was sent to prison. Smart like him, she had the same inquisitive hazel eyes and the same cheeky smile. She didn’t go to Venice Beach High like we did; I had instead enrolled her in a private girl’s school on the other side of town. The tuition was expensive but I worked long hours and it was better than her having to endure years in a building her brother had died. Pulling up to the front of the school, she started to go for the door, ‘Hey!’ I said. Ally turned back and looked at me, “Sorry, I forgot,” she replied and reached over giving me a tight hug and a kiss on the cheek. I held her tight for a little longer and then let her go. It was something we did every time we left each other. Even though she could hardly remember Danny, she still felt the loss I did and it was important to us to have that hug, it was our thing. Restarting the engine, I sat there and watched Ally in my rear view mirror until she disappeared from sight. I did that every time as well, as long as she was in my sight, I had to know that she was safe.
The drive to work was long. Located an hour outside Venice Beach, Aldridge Juvenile Detention Centre contained the worst of the worst. It was the Chino of Juvi, the place where kids of the most horrific crimes went, the place of hate. But this is what drove me; helping people is hard but helping people who don’t want to be helped is even harder. However, it was my mission to make that difference and no matter what, I wouldn’t give up. Some have asked me, ‘what was the point?’ Kids don’t listen, they’re a law unto themselves. That always amused me, I thought, ‘what? So adults listen?’ Of course the answer was ‘no’ and the adults in Chino were too far gone and I didn’t feel safe in that environment considering my past. There’s an old saying, ‘cut off the head and the body will die.’ Well, that may be true, but I came from the reversed point of view, ‘starve the body and leave the head twitching.’ That was my aim, to get to these kids while they were still young, while they still had the mind to relearn, so the body couldn’t grow and feed the ignorant, hate inspired head which drew its minions. I wise man once said that we cannot completely destroy evil, but we can keep it at bay and that was my intention.
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