Sorry! I loved this movie.

Rating: 10/10 (1 April 2012)

There's something amiss here. How can 80% of the user ratings be 7 to 10 stars, while the majority of the written reviews are 1 to 5 stars. Did only those 15% bother to write a review? I think it richly deserved the Oscar, at least based on the ones it was up against. Yes it was contrived, yes it was not subtle, yes it dwelled unrealistically on racism. Yes it is not a true depiction of L.A. But it was extremely entertaining, and had some amazingly powerful emotional moments, however unlikely. I am not an idiot, nor a simpleton. I have a doctorate from UCLA. I have seen over 2500 films, and own over 500 DVD's. Many I have seen multiple times, going back to the 1950's. Crash wove at least seven stories with multiple characters into a coherent and fascinating FICTIONAL story about racism in L.A. in a 48 hour period. It wasn't meant to be realistic, just interesting and satisfying, depicting the worst and best behavior in a condensed provocative manner. Just about everyone I know loved the film, and I stood and cheered when it won over Brokeback Mountain, which if you took out the gay aspect, would have been a deadly dull film. Before anyone accuses me of homophobia, I have nearly a dozen gay themed films that I think are excellent. (Patrik age 1,5 and A Very Serious Person are two that come to mind.) So my advice is to go more by the user ratings than the user reviews if by some chance you have yet to see Crash. And not all 5000 Academy voters are idiots, as one reviewer accused. Acting is a very difficult profession, where one has to be able to memorize scripts and be an outstanding observer of character types, then be able to get into a character so thoroughly that they become that person. I once had to help a friend make a video for a thesis, and I found it to be extremely difficult. Anyway, with apologies to all who hated this film, I stand by my 10, and think the odds are 8 in 10 you will at least like it.