THE STORY: For some reason I'm interested in Skinheads. Well, its not a mystery, really...I just can't fathom the unbridled hatred and nazi philosophy of this or any other similar group. I'm not a saint or anything, but I still can't figure out how they can have so much vile antagonism against anyone different, or have the sheer audacity to think that they are the best people around by the sheer virtue of the color of skin. Its unthinkable to me, and thus interesting. How does anyone become so twisted?

This movies has less to do with race than it has to do with a crazy love story between some skinheads and a weird chick. I saw this movie a long time before I had any idea who Russell Crowe was. As a matter of fact, I had a hard time when I saw him in other roles, to not think of him as a crazy racist bastard. That's not a knock on Mr. Crowe. I think he's a good actor to have let the image of the first role I saw him in linger in my mind so long.

Crowe is Hando, leader of a group of Australian Skinheads in Melbourne. When we first see him he's with his skinhead homeboys kicking the [unwrite] out of some Asians. Hando is seriously devoted to his nazi philosophy and he has by his side, his main homeboy, Davey. Davey seems to buy into the skinhead [unwrite], but he's a little more reserved about it. Anyway, Hando meets a girl name Gabe (Gabrielle) and they base a relationship mostly on sex. Then the movie goes into showing us how Hando and his boys live in an abandoned warehouse of some sort and basically terrorize all of the Asians that are living and running businesses in the area. Meanwhile Davey harbors unrequited love for Gabe.

Its ironic, isn't it that Hando resents the Asians owning and running businesses in his "turf" but does nothing to, say, maybe buy and run a business of his own. Maybe he could open a micro brewery. (Bigot Brau!) (Geez, I don't want to give any [unwrite]ing skinheads any ideas) but wouldn't that be like, a smart idea? Well, not to Hando. They attack a few Asian teens who are in the process of buying out their favorite bar and in return, local Asians show up to save the others. It results in a full scale brawl that I really loved on film. As Joe at Opposable Thumbs said in his review of this part in the movie the Skinheads suddenly realized "Oh [unwrite]! The odds are no longer 8 to 1!".

The skinheads suffer a major defeat (YAY!) and the Asians burn their hideout down. Hando, Gabe and a few others escape and take up residence in another warehouse, after scaring the squatters living there out. Hando wants revenge. He wants to get some guns. Gabe has a plan. You see, Gabe's back story is she's a poor little rich girl. Her father is a rich, but sick, advertising tycoon. He's was seen earlier in the movie where we get an idea of how sick he is. He's been having sex with Gabe and trying to get her back in the sack since the death of her mother. We also find out that Gabe is an epileptic...a fact she hides from everyone since she refuses to take her medicine.

Well, Gabe leads Hando and his posse in what you think is a flawless plan to rob her fathers house and get money for guns. Unfortunately, Hando and his friends are really really really stupid. (I say unfortunately, and I mean for them..not for any sane person.Besides they can't be too smart to want to be skinheads.) They goof around in the house long enough for the father to free himself and chase them all away at gunpoint....even though the skinheads could have theoretically stolen everything of value and been gone in a hot minute. A fact that Gabe rubs Hando's nose in back in their warehouse fortress of solitude. Hando, not used to being dressed down by a woman, a woman with epilepsy, no less, kicks her out. Several other people leave the group, meaning two really skanky chicks (they actually left before the robbery, but I thought I'd mention it). Davey, who is smitten with Gabe leaves also. He gives Gabe an address to reach him at and quits.

But Hando and what's left of his fanatics stay in the warehouse planning to get even. What they don't know is that Gabe goes to the nearest phone booth and drops a dime to the police ratting out her former compatriots. In short order the cops drive up to the warehouse and kick the living bejeezuz out of the skinheads...sans Hando, who was outside at the time. Hando can only witness the beating his friends get and the death of the youngest member, when he pulls a gun on the police.

Gabe meanwhile feels so bad about her treachery she goes to the address Davey gave her and [unwrite]s him.

It doesn't take too long for Hando to arrive also. He at first suspects Gabe of giving them up to the cops, but Davey convinces him that she didn't. Davey's not really sure if Gabe did or not but he gives Hando a cock and bull story covering her ass. Still knowing the police will find them if they stay stationary the three of them go on the run. Hando kills a clerk in a gas station and they rob it. Now they're really deep in the doodoo. Stopping at a beach, the three fugitives take a break. While Gabe plays on the beach Hando tries to convince Davey to dump Gabe. Gabe overhears all of the wrong parts of the conversation and goes nuts. Well, she was nuts before anyway. She sets fire to their car and tells Hando she ratted the skinheads out. This brings on the response you'd expect.

Come on....do I have to spell it out? He tries to kill her!

This naturally leads to a fight between Davey and Hando, forcing Davey to kill his best friend over the woman he loves...ironically with a "Hitler Youth" knife that Hando helped him pay for. As Davey comforts Gabe and Hando lies bleeding on the beach a group of Asian tourists watches from afar, not having seen the entire confrontation. One of the asks another, concerned "Do you think they're all right?".

I really enjoyed this movie. Its probably the only movie that almost made me feel the slightest sympathy for a skinhead. Davey was forced to kill his friend and why? Because he loved Gabe...who in turn was a psycho. Not just because she was epileptic...if you watch this movie it becomes clear that she has a lot of problems in the ol' brain basket. Still, on another level it may in a roundabout way convince some young soul that skinheads are basically idiots. That is if the young soul doesn't want to live in warehouse with a bunch of idiots and screw really stupid looking chicks.

Russell Crowe was Hando and he did it so well that I'm kind of wary of ever meeting him in person. Daniel Pollock, who looks familiar to me was Davey. Gabe was Jacqueline McKenzie.

Best Lines: "I ain't livin' with no fat bitch!"- Magoo, a skinhead leader tells his girlfriend to stop eating fattening foods. < sarcasm>Geez, skinheads are so romantic.</sarcasm>

ARE YOU KIDDING ME?:

1.) The skinheads live in a bigass warehouse. I must have missed any dialogue explaining how they pay for it, because they must or why don't the police chase them out of there? To make it even crazier, the cops would have to know they live there considering the wild parties they throw! Still, who would want to live in that dump?

2.) Um, considering what I just wrote, didn't the Asians in the beginning of the movie report the brutal skinhead attack? I guess not, because as I said the skinhead HQ is pretty much asking to be found. You can say the Asians don't trust the cops, but come on...Hando and crew almost killed the Asian teens...and it wasn't for lack of trying...someone would have talked.

3.) I don't really give a rats turd about skinhead philosophies but the women the skins have in this movie...besides Gabe, who is only tolerably good looking...are ugly. Imagine the worst makeup job on the worst weird ass 80's female crazy person singer you can think of....okay, now imagine if that was ten times worse. That's the chicks these guy have. You know, if Hitler liked babes like this no wonder we kicked his ass.

NUDITY AND SEX:  Hando screws Gabe. Later Davey screws Gabe. Gabe's teeny tits are seen.

HUH?:  Is Australia littered with a lot of abandoned warehouses? How do the skinheads and the drug addicted fools they force to move live in these places? They have to pay for it...because there's electricity and water. But...but,....why pay for a large space like that? If you have no legal means to gain money isn't that kind of crazy? A place like that must cost a fortune. I have a job and I probably couldn't afford it....why do the skinheads?...why am I asking? I hate skinheads.

I find it funny that the skinheads turn and run when met with a force equal in numbers. Its not a real "huh" type thing...I just like it because skinheads suck.

Knowing that Hando is crazy bastard, why does Davey go with him and take Gabe when he learns the others were arrested? He told Hando that Gabe didn't rat them out. (Even though the scene indicates that Davey suspects she really did) He could just say "I'm out man. Me and Gabe are together now and we don't want this [unwrite] in our lives.". What could Hando do? Either turn himself in and hope the cops would believe that Davey was there in order to get some piss poor revenge, or keep on hiding out. Personally I think Davey put too much value on his friendship with a fruitcake like Hando....who was obviously heading for a bad end.

THE FINAL JUDGEMENT: This is one of those movies that never really needed to be judged by the Inferno, but I wanted to make people aware of it. For another opinion of it check out Opposable Thumbs...Joe is a master at dissecting these kinds of movies. Whatever you might think of this review, I think you ought to give Romper Stomper a try. Its a well made movie and you can see Russell Crowe in one of his earliest roles. Stop reading and romp and stomp your way to the video store! (actually, KEEP READING! Romp and stomp your way there when you're done!)

Wanna second opinion....visit the most excellent Opposable Thumbs!