Was there a movie that swung a bigger hammer than Paul Haggis’ preposterously overblown “Crash”? Within the first five minutes, you have Don Cheadle’s speech about how sometimes people have to run into one another just to feel alive – a statement that made me think of the other “Crash,” David Cronenberg’s ode to the outer limits of kinky sex – and even the woman he’s talking to thinks he’s nuts. If only she could have warned the others.
Minutes later, two people are arguing over a fender bender, and within seconds, the conversation devolves into a Racial Slur Extravaganza. “I blaked too fast?” the woman says snidely to the Chinese woman who ran into her. Later, Matt Dillon’s character, in an attempt to get his father in to see a doctor, mocks the name of the black woman he’s talking to that works for his HMO. She, of course, hangs up on him, but before the movie’s over, even she is spewing racial slurs at yet another Asian driver. “Do you speak American?” she says. Puh, leeze.
Have you ever, ever heard people talk like that in real life? No, you haven’t, and you know why? Because almost no one does. Does racism exist? Undoubtedly. But for God’s sake, would you openly mock someone’s speech habits (the “blake lights” bit) in front of a cop after a car accident? Of course not, because it would be fucking stupid to do so. Would you make fun of someone’s name over the phone if you needed their help? Of course not, because it would be fucking stupid to do so. Would you go from stone cold bitch wife of the district attorney, who hates all non-whites, to a blubbering mess of a woman who “realizes” in the blink of an eye that the housekeeper is her best friend? No, because the woman isn’t her best friend. She’s just the only person who tolerates her bullshit, and she’s only doing that because she is paid to do so.
There is not one genuine moment in the movie, not a single note that rings true to the human condition. Even the movie’s best moment, when Terrence Howard’s Oreo character refuses to get carjacked by Ludacris and Larenz Tate and kicks the shit out of them both, is ruined when Howard protects Ludacris from policemen who are ready to gun them both down. Maybe he’s giving the guy a break because he wants to teach him a lesson about self-respect. But if I just stood up to a guy who tried the steal my car, and he’s still in my car when the police come looking for him, they can fucking have him. Does that make me a racist?
Then there’s Matt Dillon’s assault of Thandie Newton, in what appears to be a populated area where anyone at any time could have walked by and seen him groping her, which is why it’s utterly ridiculous that he would have done any such thing. He is supposedly redeemed later when he saves her from the accident that would have surely killed her – did you notice how Newton said nothing to Howard about nearly dying when she spoke to him afterwards? That’s how contrived that accident was – but is he really redeemed? He’s still the same pig he always was, and she still doesn’t forgive him for what he did before, and nor should she. Even Daniel Dae Kim’s character, the one that Ludacris and Tate run over, is revealed to be trafficking in Korean immigrants. Oh, and Cheadle’s character is viewed as a disappointment by his mother because he, unlike his troublemaking brother, has a job. Only the Mexican locksmith escapes the movie un-smeared.
But here is the one thing about “Crash” that no one seems to be talking about: it’s “Magnolia” in disguise. (Props go to Colin Mack, Ohio State movie critic and intern for the Owens Group, this is all his idea.) Both are meandering movies about a bunch of foul-mouthed, irredeemable Los Angelenos with seemingly no connection to each other thrown on a collision course to learn a Valuable Lesson about tolerance, or honoring thy mother and father, or drugs, or whatever the hell “Magnolia” was about. One movie ends with a Biblical rain of frogs, the other ends with snow. Both drove me bonkers.
What I fear the most is that awarding “Crash” with a Best Picture Oscar will only encourage more filmmakers to swing heavier hammers, to the point where going to the movies will be like going to school: no one leaves until they’ve learned something! (Not that it isn’t like that already: look at those nominees, geez.) Me, I think movies should be more like recess, which is why my favorite movies from last year were either in the Best Documentary category (“March of the Penguins,” “Murderball,” “Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room”) or straight-up action movies and comedies (“Batman Begins,” “Wedding Crashers”). Hell, my favorite movie so far this year is “Final Destination 3.”
Does that make me shallow, or unconcerned about the welfare of my fellow man? Not at all. It just means that I have no use for an oversimplified movie that passes off the absolute worst of humanity as the state of race relations in this country. I don’t know anyone who acts like that, ever. If you do, you need to get new friends.
Haggis is probably a very talented guy, but anytime I see his name attached to a movie, I’m bringing boxing gloves. If he starts hitting me over the head, I’m hitting back, damn it. Bully for him, “Crash” won Best Picture. That doesn’t mean it isn’t completely insufferable.
