36 hours of violence and racial strife in Los Angeles county, pop. 85

Rating: 6/10 (22 February 2006)

OK, so it's not quite as unbelievable as the frog storm in "Magnolia". But only just.
"Crash" clearly wants to be a movie about real life in a major city which mixes different ethnic groups who understand each other only very imperfectly, if at all. But the coincidences, happenstances, chance occurrences that bring the dozen or so characters together again and again over a couple of days could never happen in real life, certainly not in a major city.
Film critic A.O. Scott was on the money when he noted that judging from this movie, the population of Los Angeles must be well under one hundred souls, give or take a handful of illegal Thai immigrants. And it's even more preposterous to suppose that nearly all the major characters in the film have had life-changing experiences in just this 36-hour period.
And even in LA, does everything really hinge on race and prejudice like this? Virtually every conversation flogs the race issue. Enough already!
It has some powerful scenes, and some lessons for us all about tolerance, but it comes off as way too cartoonish and manipulative to be called a great movie.