The truth is: Hitler was a good man to his family

Rating: 10/10 (18 April 2006)

I had to reedit this comment, because after just finishing watching this movie i was so overflowing with philosophical comment.
I'm sure another movie will come along which i'll give ten stars to and so i'll think of this one as 8.5 stars or somesuch. But for now, after just watching this, i'm saying two thumbs up! So for now, for me, this movie is on top in the way the whole thing is assembled, filmed and directed.
I am reediting my comments here, but this will be somewhat philosophical anyway, because, in short, this is what you will take away from a nice grounded movie like this.
What i liked about this best is that this movie actually made me emotional, in a "English patient" way (like few other movies do) which is probably why, when looking through all the comments on IMDb.com, there is lots and lots of opinion about this movie. I think that's the best a movie producer could hope for. And it is a reflection of the polarity this movie holds (the contrasting situations it threads together) And in a "Mystic river" way, in a few places i was thinking, but this is acting (like i was thinking when Denzel says f***ing in "inside man"), yet it still drew me in and got me emotional.
Maybe what spurs me to give it ten stars is that, although there is a concerted effort by the makers of this film not to portray any good or bad sides of story or characters - any goodies V baddies rudder, or even good V bad BEHAVIOR - you CAN take away a nice sense of "pay it forward" closure, because, afterall, it's just a movie you can walk away from at the end. Trying to communicate this "pay it forward" theme to people who are jilted and can't get past their own preconceived "goodies and baddies" is something that resonates in my life right now, so that is why it holds so much meaning for me. I think me and the person who wrote this film truly see eye to eye in that sense. Yet it weaves this pay it forward theme in a very grounded way, in terms that give the film a stark "real"ness, like "mystic river" or "million dollar baby". The way it ebbs and flows situationally gives it a reality you can get caught up in, and can then reflect upon in a tangible way when you come away, because it pulls you into a sense of realistic familiarity, like those aforementioned movies do, rather than being a "escapism" movie.
Something that drums through the film reminds me of Will Smith's "six degrees of separation" spiel. And so this is how the movie begins, as though the "black guy" takes this theme up where Will Smith in six degrees left off, and so i felt that this film was talking to me about that process of spirit needing to turn in on itself so that we "crash" with the people around us in order to help make poignant for us an arrangement on some other level, in place of some more formal social way of understanding of that arrangement.
This film took a lot of money to make so i hear. No special special effects or anything. But it shows. I remember after watching the mothman prophecies, i was after it thinking about how various ideas could have been portrayed better, or differently, and then i saw the making of that movie straight after, and so it made lots of sense when the producer kept arguing about the monies available and how much certain parts were being curtailed. I wasn't thinking about any of that after crash. This film truly reflects a good budget, like the producer got what he wanted.