hyphenated twentysomething

My Opinion of "Crash"

This post is my response to recent articles and reviews I have read in regards to the movie "Crash", especially after it won the Oscar for Best Movie.

I read the article in the Nation as well as the two links that the post referred to in reference to the movie, Crash. And I do agree with some of their criticisms, but I certainly don’t think it was the worst movie of the year. However, is it the best movie of the year? I don’t know. Frankly, I haven’t seen all of wonderful or highly acclaimed movies in 2005 and I haven’t even seen the other movies that were nominated along with Crash in the Best Movie category at the Oscars either. But, I would say, that in the limited number of movies that I have seen recently, Crash is definitely up there. I think that both the article and some of the other opinion pieces that I have read quite frankly expected too much of the film and wanted it to mean much more that it really should. In my naïve opinion, I never felt that the movie was a didactic film on race relations and how we can all learn to be more tolerant and improve race relations in America in the 21st century. I just think that’s a bunch of bs and people are expecting a little movie to really change their lives and their outlooks forever. That’s not the purpose of the movie. Yes, I do think it’s meant to be taken seriously, but not to the extent that it will change how we all interact in the future. Rather, I felt it touched on some key points that I felt were necessary to be shown, especially post 9/11 and that is why I really found the movie to be intriguing and observational. Not necessarily life-changing.

I liked the fact that the scenes were graphic, in-your-face, abrupt, and sharp. To me, it showed the sharpness and directness of racism and particularly discrimination in the U. S. As much as we don’t talk about it, or like to think about, race is always in our minds (sometimes in the back of it, but still there nevertheless). Also, in the movie, each character is not able to see the other for the actual person he/she is. So of course, it is only when he/she crashes that another side of them is viewed. And then each character is a little better for it. Like Roger Ebert said, better does not mean wiser, or happier. It just means that they have added a new perspective to their lives. Will it forever change them? Who knows? Probably not. But what’s hopeful and unifying about the movie, is that all people, regardless of race, class, city, religion all have fears, stereotypes, and certain misconceptions when it comes to people that are different than them. Heck it even comes within a very democratic, multicultural society and basically one-race nation such as India. Even within races, I’m sure a Gujarati may have certain prejudices and stereotypes of a Punjabi and vice versa. Not always a bad thing. But always present nevertheless. Diversity does that in any nation. If we are to believe that America is a nation of immigrants (which is what I like to believe even if it’s a little romantic at times), then diversity will result in prejudices and stereotypes. Let’s confront them and get them out into the open. And as the movie portrays, let’s CRASH into each other. Because then hopefully we’ll see another perspective and think about our motives and reasons behind our prejudices.

Also, the movie of course does have its flaws. It does not portray the Asian-American population with much depth and the whole human trafficking issue was a little out there (meaning that the way it was depicted in the movie was very soft and a little romanticized). In addition, no, maybe it’s not an accurate portrayal of L.A. or for that matter, any other U. S. city. But I think those racist sentiments of which some are hidden and some are blunt, some are learned and some are inherent, the idea that we want to be open to diversity and yet are hypocritical because we don’t often take the time to learn about other races, is all a part of us, even if we deny it. We all have prejudices that sometimes contradict what we are taught to believe and or what we want to believe. That’s in my opinion what the movie is about. Prejudices. Sometimes we do away with them or actually confront them if a life-changing experience occurs that may make us see everything a new light (like what all the characters go through). But I don’t think that necessarily means that the prejudice is gone or that we are forever changed, and will from that point on, look at all races equally or reconsider how we treat others. Because in the end, we do all motives, stereotypes, and other parts of our behavior that just cannot be changed. Nevertheless, this does NOT mean we should always assume the bad motives in others. Life’s not that easy. We are all not flat characters. Sometimes we rise above are moral gravities, and sometimes we don’t. On a much larger note, something that I thought about after the movie was that we should not always be asking others to stop spewing their stereotypes. Rather, we should take the initiative and use our strength to educate others about our race/religion/ethnicity so that we can build stronger, more understanding race relations in the future.

Also, as far as race movies go, I prefer movies that ask “white” people to take a step back and to observe and interact with society from a “non-white” perspective which I don’t think this movie did necessarily well. Yes it shows prejudices, uncomfortable scenes, and redeems some of them, but it still doesn’t undermine the white (majority) sense of privilege which they believe they still have. A good racial film (especially for whites) should be one that makes them uncomfortable, frustrated, and helps them feel unprivileged since they are not used to seeing things from a minority point of view. Because that is often the position for many non-whites-aka muslims, latinos, blacks, etc. I hear that movies such as Avenue Q, Cache, and Manderlay do just this and therefore are much better films in regards to race relations. And I’m sure that’s correct.

I’m sure there’s a lot more I could say and argue against for some of the claims that were made. But I haven’t seen the movie in a long time and therefore don’t remember all the nit-picky details to use in my defense. Anyways, here’s my opinion for what its worth.

posted by payal @ 10:02 PM