Crash [2005] [DVD]

Brilliantly scripted, fantastic acting, wonderful cinematography. What a shame I waited so long to see it. Complex and challenging issues - political, emotional, social, economic -woven together in an infinitely complex way, without end, forever. And that's everybody's life.

Flawless performances from an understated cast, yet the vignettes offer barely a few minutes screen time apiece and most have probably enjoyed several weeks build-up in fur lined trailers "in-character" before playing to the lens.Best performance? Take your pick, I won't be arguing, but for me Matt Dillon deserves the nod if only for the demonstrating just how far he has travelled since 90210 and THERE'S SOMETHING ABOUT...The film is far from perfect, and not the accurate portrayal it was held to be. The issues are as raw as you'll find them, but the characters remain superficial throughout. We get to know OF them without getting to KNOW them. I'll suggest Haggis took an enormous risk - and won - hanging his hat on story in favour of depth. None become worthy people. All are deeply flawed and possibly only one deserves redemption by the time the titles roll.The film uses a well tried if complicated formula. Take a multiple of disparate characters and observe as they proceed in parallel toward the concluding common plot point where unrelated lives finally knit together. Use Pulp Fiction as your template, but there the similarity ends. This movie is best enjoyed completely unspoiled, so for synopsis you'll have to look elsewhere. Taking a break midway doesn't mean confusion, but missing even a single minute risks denting your appreciation of the complete work.The direction is fluid and cohesive, though there is visibly still too much gloss for this set of LA tales. Haggis styles-it-out like Michael Mann...when he feels up to it. Heat [DVD] [1995 ]While replete with epithets and stereotypes intended to flesh out the race based social commentary, I recommend Spike Lees "Joints" for cinematic accuracy on the American (because it is unique) race issue. Lee tells it like it is because he really was "there". Bold enough to tell white folks the truth. Honest enough to tell black folks the TRUTH. Highly controversial, often offensive, leaving no-one unscathed.  Jungle Fever [DVD ]CRASH is class conscious, at times aloof and intellectual where it ought to be gritty ghetto. A "black" film for republicans? Unkind but valid. Haggis chooses race to steer the story carefully to his conclusion that our failure to understand each other is neither black nor white but human. We are equally capable of being exploited and of exploiting others. It's just a question applying sufficient motivation.CRASH saves its gilt-edged moment to the three-quarter mark, whereupon we are treated to a "SIXTH SENSE" revelation so solid that Haggis could have followed with dancing girls wearing Hitler fatigues and still not lost the Oscar. Speaking of which, it is obvious why folk regard the Academy Award as a steal.  Brokeback Mountain [DVD] [2005 ]was the one THEY just couldn't vote for. Though I am yet to see Gylenhaal & Ledger, CRASH has too many vulnerabilities to have been assured victory in a straight punch-up. Ultimately the piece is bereft of character development, although due correction would turn this into the prelude to the long running franchise needed to fatten so many characters before your cinema ticket had run out.It remains simply brilliant story telling with no wasted footage. If you had read it, if someone recounted the way we did when video still meant Betamax, or you watched it unfolding scene by scene, it delivers its taller tale with clarity and with very few plot holes. It is exceptional entertainment that lands only metres short of art. Watch it for the first time and you'll be talking about it for days. Re-run the disc and it decends to a good night in, so much hinges on the plot revelations that you'll need to leave a lot of time before watching again to get the same buzz.Judged purely by what it is rather than what it tries to be, it remains my favourite of 2005 - no question.

One of those films that makes you want to watch it all over again right away. The way this intelligent gem works is that it makes you ultimately not want anything bad to happen to any of these people. The "heroes and villains" we encounter are brilliantly taken beyond type and become real enough for us genuinely to care - how much better is that than the soft-soap preachifying we get out of so many other "issue" pieces that strap their hearts onto their sleeves from the outset! "Crash" goes for the brain. It bonds you with an intriguing cross-section of recognisable individuals, challenging expectations all the time.It's no less engaging and entertaining for all that, pulling off several mind-changes with little in the way of obvious moral convolution but much invested in character study and telling, accumulating, intersecting incidents. Plus it contains a couple of the most dry-mouthed, breath-catching suspense set-pieces you're likely to experience. The musical score matches this effective subversion by giving you moving, haunting themes in action-moments where more obvious players would lump in the techno-beats. Wit sparks in the dialogue where others would pile on the profanity and tough-talk. There's an elegance to the whole piece that makes what goes on cherishable rather than disposable.All the characters whose lives collide here are divided - by class, gender, age and, of course, race (this last element being the paradoxical link, other than narrative, that "unites" the cast in being the focus for their various alienations). They are also variously unappealing or likeable in their "types" and behaviours. So just to shake this lot together in a series of overlapping incidents would have been engaging enough, given the acting abilities of all concerned and the terrific dialogue they're given.As I said, though, the film's moral triumph is to take our sympathies and allegiances and work on them until we realise that the "value" of everyone here is that they deserve to stay in the world. We're ultimately surprised by the value and humanity to which everyone here is seen to aspire in their way. The film is exciting, harrowing and funny enough to hit all the right buttons in terms of good, popular viewing; but the affirmative difference it finally makes is well worth celebrating. It even inspired The Academy to get it right for a change!