Romper Stomper (1992)

Australian white power punks are the hardest corest cause they tell even the Aboriginals to go home!

Genre: Action Drama (Australia)

Starring: Russell Crowe (A Beautiful Mind; Gladiator), Jacqueline McKenzie (Divine Secrets Of The Ya-Ya Sisterhood)

Directed By: Geoffrey Wright

Overview: With focus on the alpha male leader of a gang of Neo-Nazi skinheads, we witness the curse of a lonely girl who gets between this group of fanatics.

Acting: Russell Crowe, though a little too melodramatic (throwing his plate of pasta around cause it's wop food), still did an amazing job. I blame the writing and the direction for the moments of 'over-the-top'. This was an amazing role and frightening in it's realism. All the other main characters were also good, though often melodramatic as well to the point of disbelief, but again, blame the director.
Rating: 8

Cinematography: The look of the scenes were low-budget, yes, but it was still professional, and the gritty look actually made it seem more skid-punk, enhancing the mood of the thing. The visuals weren't full of wonder, but the party scenes, and the inside of their squats and those battle scenes really looked good.
Rating: 7

Script: The writing was decent and though a little meshed around the overzealous direction and plot-cramming, the words exchanged are still great.
Rating: 7

Plot: The unfolding of this tale is AMAZING for the first half, and we learn our lesson. As soon as the second in command leaves, and the aftermath, the movie should have ended there. Instead it takes a turn and it's like they crammed it in our faces so FULLY as to make sure that we got it, a touch of 'Spielbergism', shall we say? Either way, the story takes brotherhood and makes it a little too black and white. Seriously melodramatic, too much so, but still a good story!
Rating: 7

Mood: The look of skin, the punk, the poverty and parties, the gang mentality, the battle royale, it's nice. They convince you that you're living the low life. Those outfits and tattoos too, holy that gets a point all on it's own. A really immersive scene.
Rating: 8

Sweet, check out the punchin' arm!

Overall Rating: 74% (A Kicker)

Aftertaste: This is one of those totally underrated films. All anyone said about this was, "Oh, it's ok." I think it's certainly more than ok, but don't get deceived by the first half of the movie. Unfortunately this film has Full Metal Jacket syndrome all over it, that being the fact that it's a terrifically amazing movie that ends up going someplace it shouldn't have. Too much melodrama in the end made this seem more like a teen public service announcement than an unique and exciting tale that the beginning was. I recommend this to anyone interested in Sub-Culture film. A good Industrial-Goth film would be nice huh? Oh, right. Dracula and Hardware are already out there...