Crash

Tonight, we saw the movie "Crash." I had heard it was all about the crash of different cultures (and I’m into culture, big time), so I wanted to see it. It was still in our theater back home when we left for vacation, but when we got to Florida, the only place showing it was too far away. Rats! I’d have to wait until it came out on DVD- if I remembered!

But a new theater just opened nearby and it’s showing Crash 2 times a day- evenings, so we’d have to pay full price (no matinee price then). But I especially wanted to see it, so we went anyway. Besides, they were offering free popcorn and drink to every ticket holder!

Okay, if you haven’t seen "Crash" and it’s still showing near you- what are you waiting for? It is a powerful masterpiece on how people from many different cultures misunderstand each other yet our lives interweave anyway. What one person did at one point, caused a chain reaction that touched everyone’s lives in the movie. Your viewpoint was warped and twisted until the people you hated were the people you appreciated and the people you appreciated, you weren’t sure about any more.

Two words of warning: 1) It’s rated R, which means there are a couple of unnecessary sex scenes or references and the language was rough at times (it’s a sad commentary in itself that the language was accurate in those situations) 2) The "humor" is designed to point out who in the theater is prejudiced or not. Here’s what I mean:

I found two kinds of laughter happening: 1) People were seeing the "joke" as a racial stereotype i.e.: laughing because there were actually people who thought this way and 2) People were laughing because they thought the "joke" was true, therefore funny (like if different Hispanic cultures were not the same, then who taught them all to park their cars on their lawns?). And there was at least one lady in our showing who was laughing for the wrong reasons.

Well, I won’t spoil it for you by giving away any of the highlights, but I will certainly be thinking about this one for a long time to come. This is one movie I will buy when it comes out on DVD and watch again and again. There are so many nuances you can’t possibly pick up in just one showing.