"Crash" is not a Date Film
Normally on Fridays, Bookie and I schedule an in-house date. We hole ourselves in our room with snacks, drinks, and a variety of DVD rentals, leaving our kids with the strict rule of no interruptions, save for emergencies. After the movies, we tend to move where the mood takes us, and I don’t want to be too graphic, but it normally involves copious amounts of intimacy and affection.
The in-house date is a welcome treat for us, but every once in a while, we screw it up by viewing a buzz-kill movie. It’s not that the movie is of poor quality. In fact, sometimes the films are dramatic masterpieces, like “Glory” (1989), but anyone who has seen the final segment of that film where a mass grave is being filled with Union soldiers, knows that it’s not a date movie. Such is the case for a recently viewed DVD, called “Crash”.
I don’t follow the trends of Hollywood or the Academy awards, but I heard that this film was controversial. So I popped-in the DVD with no clear expectations, other than Brendon Frasier and Sandra Bullock could possibly combine to ruin my mood by being annoying and generally stinking-up the joint in typical, romantic comedy fashion. Well I was wrong about the romantic comedy part, and Bendon and Sandra were not as smug as I thought they’d be. Still, this is not a date movie.
Though clearly, not a date movie, “Crash” is an instant classic. It explores racism from perspectives not commonly seen in modern film, meaning that it’s brutally honest. Numerous characters from diverse cultural, philosophical, racial, and financial backgrounds randomly interact with one another, often with disturbing results. The raw, aggressive bigotry in this movie reminded me of Spike Lee’s “Do The Right Thing” (1989). But while Spike Lee’s film was a slow-burning, smoldering build-up to an inevitable riotous explosion, the plot of “Crash” can best be described as a bubbling caldron, boiling-over from the very beginning with intolerance, animosity, resentment, mistrust, confusion, and ultimately, introspection when the characters find themselves in situations that force them to reexamine their prejudices.
I also found it interesting how the dualistic nature of humanity is explored. In one of the beginning segments, while walking in a predominantly White, upscale neighborhood, a black man named Anthony (Chris "Ludacris" Bridges) rants to his friend, Peter (Larenz Tate) about the inequity of racial profiling and unfounded fear of violence and theft he sees in the eyes of White people, just before they carjacked a White couple. I never saw that coming.
In fact, the unpredictable twists and turns of “Crash” hooked me from the very beginning, and held my attention clear through to the ending credits. The only predictable part was that there wouldn’t be a clear happy ending, which rings true to life, as racism remains a tangible problem, despite modern society’s continuing efforts to conceal it behind a veneer of political correctness. I would have liked for the characters to have been fleshed-out a bit more to provide a greater understanding for their prejudiced views, but overall, this film was every-bit as good as advertised.
I wouldn’t recommend it for a date night though, unless your ideal date involves holding one another, lamenting between melancholy sighs about humanity’s inability to break the cycle of hatred, intolerance and mistrust. Oh yeah, that’s way more fun than bumpin’ uglies, isn’t it?
1)Story: A
2)Acting: B (Not even Sandra Bullock could screw-up this film for me.)
3)Visuals: B+
4)Originality/Innovation: A
5)Enjoyability Grade: B
6)Date Material: D (Total bum-out. No boom-boom after this one. Chase it with a physical comedy.)
7)Contemporary Element (Will it be watchable two decades from now?): B-
8)Overall Grade: A
9)DVD Extras: NA (I was too bummed to view the extras.)
***
Blind Eye Turning: Poems, Prose, and other Scribbles, by Barry Dawson
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