‘Crash’ gets three stars, tops

I finally got around to seeing “Crash,” which I thought was a pretty well-made film — but best picture Oscar? No way. I think Ang Lee has reason for sour grapes — “Brokeback Mountain” got robbed.
Some of the performances are good (notably Matt Dillon’s), but the characters are stereotypical and the dialogue about race heavy-handed and manipulative (and unrealistic). Everyone, even the racists, have hearts of gold underneath. This was an exercise in predictable, self-consciously “important” message filmmaking. Did the academy lose its nerve and decide to choose the “safe” controversial film?
Did you see it? What did you think?
Posted by Randy Scholfield

5 Comments

  1. flike
    Posted March 19, 2006 at 10:25 am | Permalink

    I haven’t seen Brokeback, so I can’t comment on comparisons.

    However, I agree that Crash was waaaay overrated.

    If Crash can win Best Pic, then I feel pretty good with an old decision I made to quit the movie theater experience and enjoy movies at home instead.

  2. Joe Williams
    Posted March 19, 2006 at 11:09 am | Permalink

    I haven’t seen Brokeback yet either. Waiting for it to come out on DVD.

    Crash was a decent movie, but movies that get the Best Picture nod in the last several years have really been a let down.

    Has there ever been a Comedy that was Best Picture winner?

    It seems to me that they only give the nod to drams of semi-contraversial nature. Crash, Million Dollar Baby, American Beauty, and etc.

    The movies are ok, but not great. They used to have great movies get the Best Picture nod, like in the 80’s with Ghandi and The Last Emporer. Those are great movies.

  3. k
    Posted March 19, 2006 at 1:39 pm | Permalink

    I think the quality of movies comming out of Hollywood in the last 10 years or so have at best been so-so. I liked Crash and I thought it was one of the better movies I’ve seen in a while (and definately this past year). But Hollywood just keeps pumping out the mindless kill’em all movies because that is what the masses want to see. That is their bread and butter. Those of us want the silly little things like plot or acting are left with VHS tapes of the ‘classics’.

    And the killer, the movie execs have no clue why theater attendance has been falling.

  4. kelly
    Posted March 19, 2006 at 4:16 pm | Permalink

    I saw both movies, and I thought Brokeback should have won Best Picture, but not because of the subject of a romantic trajedy involving gay lovers. I thought it was “cutting edge” for that reason, but I thought its more worthy attributes were (1) tremendous screenplay and dialogue; (2) Heath Ledgers portrayal of the western male personae, which was perfect; and (3) the deft handling of all of the emotional conflicts in the movie – between the lovers and their wives, between the lovers and their children, and between the lovers and in-laws and employers. The cinematography was great too.

    But Crash won, I think, because it was a movie that illustrated the many faces of racial prejudice. I can only speak for myself, of course, but this is a movie which hurt my heart to watch. And in the last analysis, I think that is the reason it won – because too many people walk through life not understanding how important of an issue racial prejudice still is in this country.

  5. Rom Lewis
    Posted March 20, 2006 at 8:23 am | Permalink

    Oh well………Everyone gets “shafted” sometimes in life