Very contrived, unnatural and manipulative. Lousy music.

Rating: 3/10 (2 May 2006)

Contrived, pretentious, and over-rated. Everything magically falls into place in this movie to tell the story, which is ... RACISM is ...BAD ! There are several over-the-top coincidences here. Are there only eight people in all of LA, and do they all happen to meet each other in 24 hours ? I'm sorry, but life doesn't work that way.
There are also various incongruous elements, such as the chop-shop fence not wanting to accept an SUV with a little blood underneath, but fully willing to engage in people-trafficking and slavery, with everything that entails. The scene with the cop stand-off is the most ridiculous. We all know that the black driver, anywhere in the good ole USA would have had about twenty-five bullet holes in him when he disregarded the cops' orders.
Some of the acting is decent, notably Cheadle, Bullock, Ludicrous, Dillon, and the young white "good" cop but some of the accents are LOUSY. What's up with the negative stereotyping of Asians ? Why are all the characters so simple and unidimensional ? And the ending, just like the beginning. How neat. Oh, the miracle of snow in LA, it's Christmas folks !. What a perfect piece of Hollywood dribble.
On a positive note, I see that many fellow IMDb reviewers found this movie as bad as I did, and their comments were more insightful than the pro reviewers'.
As alternatives, I recommend "21 Grams" or Lee's "Do the right thing". If you want a head trip having nothing to do with racism, watch "Zardoz".