An ordinary public housing project with no more problems than most wakes up one morning in a state of siege. The kids from the "Bluebell" projects have spent all night warring with the police. Why? Because a 16-year-old boy, Abdel Ichah, is at death's door after being beaten up under questioning by a police officer. One more case of police brutality, one more riot. Among these kids blinded by HATE for the system are three homeboys : Hubert, Said and Vinz. Together they're about to live the most important day of their lives. Because today there aren't just three of them, there are four. There's Said, struggling to get by on nickel-and-dime dope deals that keep turning sour. There's Hubert, convinced that keeping the peace is the only way for the community to survive. There's Vinz, who thinks the only key to survival is HATE. And there's the fourth hero of our story: the gleaming, chrome-plated Smith & Weston 44 which a plainclothes policeman is reported to have lost somewhere on the projects during the rioting. Twenty-four hours in the life of the projects and the kids who live there. Twenty-four hours to find a solution to the HATE that keeps both sides at each other's throats. Because if killing a cop with his own gun isn't the answer.... Then what is?

One of France's brightest new hopes, Mathieu Kassovitz has at twenty-five already made his mark as both director and actor, having won the Most Promising Young Actor Cesar (French film awards) for his role of a mentally retarded youth trained as a hired gun in Jacques Audiard's SEE HOW THEY FALL (Regarde les Hommes Tomber). Kassovitz' main vocation, however, is directing, and he drew critical acclaim at home and at the New York Film Festival for his first feature CAFÉ AU LAIT, which he wrote, directed and starred in. His self-parodying role of a Jewish bicycle messenger caught in a multi-racial love triangle led many to compare him to both Spike Lee and Woody Allen. His new film, HATE is a social drama set in the industrial suburbs of Paris, and deals with police — and community — brutality.