Crash

Crash got a great buzz when it was released in theaters, just a few months ago. It seems like the release periods are getting shorter and shorter as producers try to capitalize more on their primary promotion. With attention spans shrinking from massive inundation, we can't remember the film's promotion by the time the DVD comes out and they have to duplicate efforts... unless they bring out the DVDs quicker. Since DVD sales outpace box office by some 300%.... you do the math. The commentary track, by the understated, perceptive Don Cheadle, and Paul Haggis who wrote, directed and produced, adds to the DVD, though not as much as I expected.

Also looks like the film is trying to find an Oscar niche. Cheadle had great success propelling Hotel Rwanda this way last year and I have no doubt he'll do equally well with this socially provocative gem. By bringing out both the film and DVD during slow periods, it gets viewed, and its wonderful, challenging content gets digested. The hope is that, as with Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, people will still remember all the way to voting time next winter.

In this case, I think they will. I certainly hope Don Cheadle will be recognized again because he continually comes out with such thoughtful yet entertaining films. This one plays the race card even more blatantly than Hotel Rwanda. Set in post-OJ LA, it meanders through the lives of many Angelinos who, sometimes literally, crash into each other. The LA assemblage of multiple intersecting stories concept has been done before in (all-white) movies like LA Story and LA Confidential, but this is both modern day and ultra real.... maybe too real.

It's filled with confusing cuts, too many unbelievable coincidences and lots of zoom outs into the sky. Oddly enough, none of that bothers me as much as it usually does, mostly because almost every part is played by name actor. Crash is filled with lots of insights, like how rap music can even be offensive to young black gangbangers if their lines are written by older white men to take umbrage at how condescending and demeaning rap is to blacks when you compare their their lightning fast hobitchnigga drivel with the statements of people like Huey Newton & Eldridge Cleaver.

Every character in this large and talented cast of characters is racist. Some shrink in fear out of racism, some are attracted to those outside their race, there are misunderstandings due to racism and murders due to racism. Growth and getting over ones' prejudices are shown here too. It's a cagey film, you can't ever predict who's gonna do what out of their feelings about race. And maybe that's what makes it so true to life.