Monday, July 9, 2007

" Hi Barry, yes I have seen "Crash." I found it well done but it held no surprises for me. We all have biases, prejudices, bigotry, whatever name you give it, it's there in all of us to some degree."


Thanks Sheria:
CRASH is presently my all time most fav. movie. My criteria put
acting as film ingredient numero #1. Very often I'll watch a terrific movie
except for the rotten acting.


CRASH has everything. The scene under the upside-down vehicle is easily
my most fav movie scene in all of movie history. Both actors are superb.
Their characters vivid, lifelike, full of surprises. The racist cop effortlessly puts his life on the line to rescue the woman pasenger trapped under the car in which she was riding. Earlier they had hated each other. A desperate crisis brings out the true, loving, self-sacrificing deep human love for each other in the most extreme, near lethal circumstances. As the leaking gasoline flows downhill toward her on-fire underside of the car we gasp expecting an immediate deadly explosion.


One reason, perhaps the main reason, CRASH won the Best Picture Oscar
is that the Actors division of the Motion Picture Academy voted en masse for
the movie because the success of the movie depended so graphically on the
quality fo the acting. After all it was relatively low budget, with a small, not very well known cast. Sure, the prosecutor's wife is well known but not enough to play
the lead in a movie. Her character was somewhat minor. Not that I'm knocking her, I am not, I just want to weigh why the movie was so powerful in the eyes of actors.


it's very rare, I believe, for a movie so successful to carry the burden of a message. After all the movie is a sermion on the evils of racism. Movie audiences do not like to be lectured: they want escape, excitement, a reason to forget everyday struggles. The end scene of a tailgate fender bender and pasenger screaming accusations is put there to emphasise that racism goes around and around in circles and there's never a satisfactory resolution. So the drama ends on a sober note, but it just couldn't end on a happy, lets forget the past: it'd be false. But, in sum, I pray that the movie will eventually move us just a tad closer to loving each other.


Love,
Barry


This here and not a reply to a Comment is that it's more than 'X' number of characters. I've alread turuncated it but too lazy to remember what I tried cutting.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Dear Barry, thank you for "getting me." You didn't slam the door in my face just because I disagreed with you and spoke honestly about my feelings. I think that we both have done our part in moving us just a tad closer to loving each other. I think that your assessment of "Crash" is right on target. My favorite scene is also the one with the woman trapped in the car. I think that it exemplifies that we can be better than we are. The cop's genuine concern for the woman's safety at the risk of his own life was a powerful statement about our ability to be compassionate. I'm so glad to have met you.--Sheria

Anonymous said...

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