American Hardcore

R

Released Jan 20, 2006

1 hr. 40 min.

Documentary

History

Drama

Music

List

72%

60 Reviews

Tomatometer

78%

25,000+ Ratings

Audience Score

Filmmaker Paul Rachman recalls the 1980s American punk-rock movement. The retrospective features interviews and performance footage with such bands as Black Flag, Circle Jerks, Bad Brains, Jerry's Kids, Gang Green, Poison Idea, Flipper and SS Decontrol.

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Critics Consensus

American Hardcore is an informative and highly entertaining look at the heyday of punk in the early 1980s.

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StephenPaul C

The greatest 01 hour: and 40 minutes with real footage from 1980s concerts playing punk rock!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Rated 5 out of 5 stars

06/26/23

Full Review

Audience Member

By far the best HC punk documentary. If you haven't read the book it's based on you have to buy it, it's much more informative and loaded with pictures and stories not seen in the documentary.

Rated 5 out of 5 stars

01/28/23

Full Review

Audience Member

Being someone who spend time in the hardcore punk scene in the late 90s and early 2000's I was obviously very excited to see this documentary. As the documentary will show you this music scene is more than just a music genre, but a full fledged culture and family. Things have obviously changed a bit since the eighties, but there is still that sense of family in the scene today. American Hardcore is more of a history lesson from some of the pioneers than a full fledged documentary about the entire scene. I though the movie was going to really show the full scope of not only the beginnings of hardcore and punk but also show how it has evolved over the years. This documentary really lacks overall though. It is good to see a movie even made about the subject, especially for someone who is not that familiar with the music and wants to learn about it. But for a lifelong fan of the music who already knows a lot of the history, I found it to honestly be a little boring. I think an updated version of this movie would be better suited, why stop in the eighties ? Hardcore and punk are still really strong today in cities across America. You can bring the entire thing together and end the movie in present time.

Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars

01/14/23

Full Review

william s

Interesting and entertaining bit of pile driving punk and that's a good thing.

Rated 4 out of 5 stars

03/31/23

Full Review

Audience Member

this documentary is absolutely amazing

Rated 5 out of 5 stars

01/17/23

Full Review

Audience Member

Pretty interesting if you grew up listening to this stuff. The movement was going on before my time but I grew up listening to punk and hardcore and a few of these bands were still around when I was going to shows.

Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars

02/18/23

Full Review

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Paul Rachman

Director

Lucky Lehrer

Actor

Vic Bondi

Actor

Joe Keithley

Actor

Keith Morris

Actor

Angie Sciarappa

Actor

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Michael Senft

Arizona Republic

... an enjoyable if incomplete nostalgia trip.

Rated: 3.5/5

Dec 7, 2006

Full Review

Marc Savlov

Austin Chronicle

Crammed with grainy, shot-on-the-fly mid-Eighties video footage, recent interviews, and a genuine love for its subject, American Hardcore encapsulates a largely forgotten moment in maximum rock & roll history.

Rated: 3/4

Nov 17, 2006

Full Review

Dan DeLuca

Philadelphia Inquirer

American Hardcore, Paul Rachman's impressively thorough documentary, tells of the second-generation punk rockers who learned from the Sex Pistols and Ramones and then did their DIY thing.

Rated: 3/4

Nov 10, 2006

Full Review

Cole Smithey

ColeSmithey.com

For a documentary ostensibly about the history of the hardcore punk music movement that reigned in America during the '80s, director Paul Rachman and writer Steven Blush indefensibly omit the genre's most talented and high-profile band (The Dead Kennedys)

Rated: C-

Apr 26, 2009

Full Review

Joe Lozito

Big Picture Big Sound

Rated: 3/4

Jul 14, 2007

Full Review

Matthew Smith

Film Journal International

Struggles under the weight of its own ambition.

Mar 1, 2007

Full Review

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Synopsis

Filmmaker Paul Rachman recalls the 1980s American punk-rock movement. The retrospective features interviews and performance footage with such bands as Black Flag, Circle Jerks, Bad Brains, Jerry's Kids, Gang Green, Poison Idea, Flipper and SS Decontrol.

Director: Paul Rachman
Screenwriter: Steven Blush
Production Co: EnVision Films
Rating: R (Sex and Drug References|Pervasive Language)
Genre: Documentary, History, Drama, Music
Original Language: English
Release Date (Theaters): Jan 20, 2006, Original
Rerelease Date (Theaters): Sep 22, 2006
Release Date (Streaming): Apr 16, 2012
Box Office (Gross USA): $278.8K

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