Romper Stomper

Romper Stomper (1992) is a brutal Australian crime drama by Geoffrey Wright that you can watch online on iFILM. It hands a young Russell Crowe one of his first major roles as Hando, the leader of a neo-Nazi skinhead gang in working-class Melbourne.

Hando and his crew run on violence and racial hatred, fixating on the city's Vietnamese immigrants. When those targets stop backing down and fight back, the gang starts to crack. Into this circle comes Gabe (Jacqueline McKenzie), a young woman with epilepsy and a damaged past whose entanglement with Hando and his friend Davey pulls the group apart from the inside. The film offers no heroes and makes no apology for it.

Wright shoots the street brutality plainly, without sermons, which is exactly why the movie drew both praise and accusations of dangerous ambiguity on release. It is hard to sit through by design: a study of where hatred dead-ends rather than any glamorizing of it, with Crowe already showing the presence of a future star. Best for viewers ready for genuinely uncomfortable material. Stream Romper Stomper (1992) online on iFILM.