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'Crash': A new, distinctive, welcome voice

By ELEANOR RINGEL GILLESPIE
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

The collisions in "Crash" aren't always a matter of metal and glass. People collide as well in this literate, engrossing and occasionally funny look at race relations in Los Angeles.

The news isn't good.

Lions Gate Films

'Crash'

B+

The verdict: A thoughtful and engrossing examination of racism, blessed with a splendid cast and a smart script.

Director: Paul Haggis
Starring: Sandra Bullock, Don Cheadle, Tony Danza, Matt Dillon, Jennifer Esposito, Ludacris, William Fichtner, Brendan Fraser, Terrence Dashon Howard
Run time: 113 minutes
Release date: May 6, 2005
Rating: R for language, sexual content and some violence.
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People are too isolated in L.A.'s car culture, notes police detective Graham Waters (Don Cheadle, marvelous as usual). They're locked away in their automobiles. "Nobody touches you," he says. "We miss that touch so much we crash into someone just to feel something."

Waters is one of a dozen or so Angelenos whose lives intersect, a la "Magnolia" or "Short Cuts," in "Crash." At times, the connections are a bit too convenient, but in a film as smart and compassionate as this, it's a forgivable flaw.

Take Ryan (Matt Dillon), a racist cop whose harassment of a well-to-do African-American couple, Cameron and Christine (Terrence Howard and Thandie Newton) is one of the most harrowing and repulsive scenes you'll ever see. As his disgusted rookie partner, Hanson (Ryan Phillippe), looks on, aghast, Ryan "searches" Christine in an insinuatingly sexual manner that's the equivalent of emotional rape.

Yet no one is one-dimensional in "Crash." Ryan is also a good son to an ailing father. Later, he and Christine are brought together again, in circumstances so entirely different and unexpected, the scene leaves you stunned.

Then there's ambitious district attorney Rick Cabot (Brendan Fraser) and his pampered, petty and prejudiced wife Jean (Sandra Bullock, fearlessly abandoning her Lovableness). As they walk to their Lincoln Navigator, they pass two young black men, Anthony (Chris "Ludacris" Bridges) and Peter (Larenz Tate). Anthony is loudly complaining about a racist waitress, who, we've already seen, is also black. Jean reflexively tightens her grip on Rick's arm, which does not go unnoticed. Anthony switches immediately to talking about how all white people think African-Americans are criminals and thugs. Then, in one of the movie's turn-on-a-dime reversals, he and his pal carjack the couple's SUV.

Rick is upset they're black because it might cost him the African-American vote. Jean insists they change the locks and hires (and racially berates) a Latino named Daniel (Michael Pena). He, in turn, is on a collision course with an Iranian immigrant, Farhad (Shaun Toub), who's sick and tired of being called an Arab and sick and tired of living in fear. So he buys a gun and asks Daniel to work on his locks ...

If this sounds like a lot of plot exposition, rest assured, this isn't even the half of it. Making his directorial debut, writer Paul Haggis ("Million Dollar Baby") masterfully crafts a picture that's both grave and amusing as it examines the many faces of racial hate in L.A. — and, by extension, the rest of the country.

His point is, racism is a given in the America of 2005. It's more overt in someone like Ryan or Jean, but it's there. Even in same-race confrontations. Upset Cameron didn't protect her from Ryan, Christine spits out, "The closest thing you ever came to being black was watching 'The Cosby Show.'"

Near the end, "Crash" feels a bit forced, a bit preachy. But it's never glib or self-important. And there's a wonderful moment of capricious grace that ends the movie on a note of optimism.

And yes, there actually are some car crashes. The movie begins and ends with wrecks, as if to signify, another day, another crash. Same old, same old, Haggis is telling us, but in a new, distinctive and welcome voice.