My understanding of how the story in movies proceeds is that the writer builds up the expectation of the audience and then concludes it appropriately.
I did not see that in American History X. All throughout the movie, the story builds up the expectation that Edward Norton would do something about the Neo-Nazi group that he helped establish before he was sent to Chino.
However, the movie "abruptly" ends with the death of his younger brother. Although this might sound very subjective but this seemed like an improper ending to me. Of course I don't want to argue if you liked this ending or not. But I'd like to understand what this ending was supposed to tell us. Why did the movie end in such an unexpected way and how did this ending tie in with the rest of the movie's story and themes?