DMN gave it a
B
Movie Review
By CHRIS VOGNAR / The Dallas Morning News
It's a small world after all in Crash, the new movie about racial intolerance and cosmic connection in contemporary Los Angeles. With moments of bold acting and an ear for the petty slights that set off hate alarms every day in the big, bad city, Crash remains engaging even as its layers of coincidence stretch and then break the limits of plausibility.
A sort of Grand Canyon for its times, Paul Haggis' star-studded indie takes a wide swath of Angelenos and puts them through the traumatic motions of an uncommonly eventful couple of days. The existential comedy I Heart Huckabees wondered whether we're all connected or eternally separated. Crash falls firmly on the connection side.
And many of the connections fall on the bad side. The district attorney (Brendan Fraser) and his unhappy wife (Sandra Bullock) are carjacked by two homies (Ludacris and Larenz Tate), moments after the homies have argued about why everyone immediately thinks black guys are out to rob and steal. Don Cheadle plays the older brother of one of the carjackers, a cop facing a moral quandary with internal affairs implications.
Another cop (Matt Dillon, doing his most urgent work in years) harasses a well-to-do couple (Terrence Dashon Howard and the explosive Thandie Newton), oozing racial hostility all the way. Both Mr. Howard and the racist cop's partner (Ryan Phillippe) will later have fateful encounters with the carjackers.
This is a very ambitious film with a lot on its mind and not enough discipline to get it all across. Mr. Haggis, who wrote the script for Million Dollar Baby, has divided Crash's dramatic duties between so many characters and story lines that it would have taken a miracle to hold it all together. There's so much tension here that it all stays stuck on the surface, unable to seep into the film's roots.
That said, the surface tension is always palpable and frequently explosive. Mr. Howard, his star rising fast thanks to his intensity in Ray, Lackawanna Blues and the Sundance hit Hustle and Flow, delivers a searing portrayal of a good man choking on his anger. In a film filled with pairs, he and Ms. Newton form the most vivid couple.
Mr. Haggis does an excellent job visualizing L.A. as a thousand different cities, each distinguished by its own ethnic makeup and rules of engagement. Can these mini-cities ever come together and find redemption? Mr. Haggis' interlocking story lines suggest they have no choice.
But you get the feeling Mr. Haggis is after something more cohesive and consequential here, and he never quite pulls it all together. When Ms. Bullock's snooty housewife hugs her maid and says she's her best friend, you want to laugh in derision, not cry in sympathy. Lop off a few characters, tighten the narrative geometry, and Crash might have a sledgehammer impact. As it is, the film is content to tap you on the shoulder and ask you to take a look around.