Product Description

This compelling urban thriller tracks the volatile intersection of a multiethnic cast of characters struggling to overcome their fears as they careen in and out of one another's lives. In the gray area between black and white victim and aggressor during the next 36 hours the will all collide.System Requirements: Running Time 122 MinFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: MYSTERY/SUSPENSE Rating: R UPC: 031398179382 Manufacturer No: 17938

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #484 in DVD
• Brand: CRASH (WS) (DVD MOVIE)
• Released on: 2005-09-06
• Rating: Unrated
• Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
• Formats: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD-Video, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English, Korean, Persian, Spanish
• Subtitled in: English, Spanish
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: .15 pounds
• Running time: 122 minutes

Amazon.com
Movie studios, by and large, avoid controversial subjects like race the way you might avoid a hive of angry bees. So it's remarkable that Crash even got made; that it's a rich, intelligent, and moving exploration of the interlocking lives of a dozen Los Angeles residents--black, white, latino, Asian, and Persian--is downright amazing. A politically nervous district attorney (Brendan Fraser) and his high-strung wife (Sandra Bullock, biting into a welcome change of pace from Miss Congeniality) get car-jacked by an oddly sociological pair of young black men (Larenz Tate and Chris "Ludacris" Bridges); a rich black T.V. director (Terrence Howard) and his wife (Thandie Newton) get pulled over by a white racist cop (Matt Dillon) and his reluctant partner (Ryan Phillipe); a detective (Don Cheadle) and his Latina partner and lover (Jennifer Esposito) investigate a white cop who shot a black cop--these are only three of the interlocking stories that reach up and down class lines. Writer/director Paul Haggis (who wrote the screenplay for Million Dollar Baby) spins every character in unpredictable directions, refusing to let anyone sink into a stereotype. The cast--ranging from the famous names above to lesser-known but just as capable actors like Michael Pena (Buffalo Soldiers) and Loretta Devine (Woman Thou Art Loosed)--meets the strong script head-on, delivering galvanizing performances in short vignettes, brief glimpses that build with gut-wrenching force. This sort of multi-character mosaic is hard to pull off; Crash rivals such classics as Nashville and Short Cuts. A knockout. --Bret Fetzer

Stills from Crash (click for larger image)

From The New Yorker
A brazenly alive and heartbreaking film about the rage and foolishness of intolerance-the mutual abrasions of white, black, Latino, Middle Eastern, and Asian citizens in the great and strange city of Los Angeles. The movie starts off with separate vignettes in which the characters run afoul of each other, say things better left unsaid, and get into terrible trouble. Later, they cross paths again, sometimes in bizarre coincidences that feel exactly right; some of these scenes play out at the edge of insanity, where contentiousness spills over into tragedy or farce. The furiously candid screenplay was written by Paul Haggis and Robert Moresco, and the picture was directed by Haggis, who, in his first time out as director, demonstrates an amazing skill with actors. Don Cheadle, as a withdrawn, melancholy police detective, is the star, and the other players include Terrence Howard and Thandie Newton as an upper-class African-American couple, Brendan Fraser and Sandra Bullock as an L.A. district attorney and his bitchy wife, Chris (Ludacris) Bridges and Larenz Tate as carjackers, Matt Dillon and Ryan Phillippe as cops, and Shaun Toub as an Iranian shopkeeper who thinks everyone is out to cheat him. The gentle electronic score is by Mark Isham. -David Denby
Copyright © 2006 The New Yorker

Customer Reviews

The Most Thought-Provoking Movie
I would rank this movie as one of the very best that I've seen in years. How many movies present BOTH sides of a story in such a manner that it makes you wonder about your own perceptions? It seems to me that people who scored the movie very low are either extremely stubborn and don't want to "walk a mile in some else's shoes", just don't like to think while watching a movie, or living in a fantasy world where there are no problems. The whole point of the movie is that we stereotype cultures other than our own...so, of course, the characterizations are stereotypical!

Anti-racism resource
This is a terrific movie that addresses the issue of racism in our country. It has a good cast, including Sandra Bullock and Don Cheadle, two of my favorites. It's not what I'd call a blockbuster oscar-quality flick, but it's a socially relevant movie in ways that those kind of movies often aren't.

This should be a must see for any type of anti-racist training. Although some may say that this movie is too stereotypical, its realism will strike home and give us more than a little food for thought that may actually convict us, if we're lucky.

Hated it
I am sorry but I am not into racism. I could not believe that Sandra Bullock even played in it. This movie was so stupid it is unreal. A cop trying to rape a woman in front of her husband, and then he had to tell her the next day or two when she was in a wreck that she needs to trust him. Ryan thinking a black boy was trying to kill him, shot the boy who was trying to show him something that they both have. He was a cop in the show and what he should have done was tell the boy he was a cop when he picked the boy up hitching a ride. Brandon was just to high class for my taste. He needs to stick w/ comedies. That is his strong suit. There is quite a few other big names but the bottom line rent it first before you buy it. I really wish I would had done that. I don't think it was worth my money.