Tough subject to get right; this film did

Rating: 9/10 (20 May 2005)

Crash let us know right away that it was not going to be an easy film to watch, with the characters essentially fighting each other in racial struggles sometimes to the death. The racial struggle is still inconclusive in America, and probably in the entire world, and we still don't know for sure how it will turn out. Will we survive it? Crash tried to give us a hint of hope that we may.
Crash tried to show that even though some might fear or even hate others for being different than them, we still need each other often in order to deal with life's many issues and problems. That should be the lesson...we do need each other, and emergencies like those shown in the film are the great equalizers...we are all in the same need in those situations, no matter who helps us, and we should be very grateful to those who do help us no matter what their color.
Don Cheadle is rapidly becoming a star who takes over a film from other actors, even though most did a good job, especially Matt Dillon, Terrance Howard, and even Sandra Bullock who really surprised me with her ability. Cheadle was again wonderful as he usually is, and was very soulful as a world-weary cop with a junkie mom and criminal brother riding on his overburdened shoulders.
Matt Dillon's tough/gentle cop character showed the realistic changes a person can make when thrown into conflicting situations evoking the opposite emotions of anger and compassion...one time he was an angry brute bent on cruelty, the next time a gentle and compassionate rescuer of the same person he earlier brutalized. And he was a loving son too. Just like all the rest of us can be in different life situations.
Terrance D. Howard, who has a great face and looks a lot like a black Benicio del Toro, was a standout. He was an Oreo entertainment exec hot shot in the early going and he wimped out shamefully in a tough racial situation involving his wife and a white cop, but his character came through later with some real backbone when he felt pushed hard enough to take a stand against perceived racial profiling and persecution by the police.
Stereotypes are with us because, as shown in this film, a lot of them are based on truths or half-truths, but are just plain wrong when applied to individuals. Crash showed well how wrong all races can be by pigeon-holing others into convenient niches that fit their own built-in prejudices. Sometimes it even killed them.
Great night shots of LA and wonderful film technicals throughout, using very clever cutaways that seamlessly melded one scene's end into the start of a totally different scene. Very slick and effective. The only false stretch for me was that it is realistically an impossibility for all the different characters in the film to run into each other so often in 12 million-people strong L.A. That just couldn't happen, but it made for a very interesting and fantastic drama, if not always a totally realistic one.