“Crash”: 20 Years Later
In 2004, Canadian filmmaker Paul Haggis and American filmmaker Robert Moresco premiered a poignant film Crash at the Toronto International Film Festival. Featuring an ensemble cast – Brendan Fraser, Sandra Bullock, Terrance Howard, Thandie Newton, Larenz Tate, Ryan Philippe, etc. – the film tackles racial and social tensions between several characters during the course of 2 days in Los Angeles, California.
”It Originated In a Dream”
Though the film would not officially premiere in theaters until 2005, the inspiration of Crash was born out of a carjacking incident Haggis had experienced ten years before he pitched the idea to television executives. In a 2015 interview with The Huffington Post, Haggis says, “It originated in a dream that I had. I woke up in the middle of the night thinking about these two guys who 10 years before had jacked my car…It stuck with me and I just wanted to know what their relationship was to each other.” For Haggis, the film was meant to be a social commentary on how disconnect makes everyday human interactions more difficult than usual.
Crash Feature Several Racial Slurs and Uncomfortable Conversations
Crash is a film that features several racial slurs and several uncomfortable conversations surrounding race in the early 2000’s. Twenty years later, and it seems like not much has changed. Despite the progress over the last 20 years, including the election of the first African American president, diversity becoming more visibly apparent than just implied, there is still an immense amount of racial tension and violence.
The title of the film is explained in the opening dialogue in the beginning of the film. Detective Graham Waters (portrayed by Don Cheadle) and his girlfriend/partner Ria (portrayed by Jennifer Esposito) are involved in an automobile collision. As he stares out the window, Waters says,
“It’s the sense of touch. In any real city, you walk, you know? You brush past people, people bump into you. In L.A., nobody touches you. We’re always behind this metal and glass. I think we miss that touch so much that we crash into each other, just so we can feel something.”
Black, White, Hispanic, Asian, Middle Eastern People Giving Diverse Perspectives
The dynamics of the character interactions in Crash demonstrate the diverse perspectives of everyday people from all walks of life. There are Black people, there are White people, there are Hispanic people, there are Asian people, and there are people of Middle Eastern descent. Just as in everyday life, sometimes a minor disagreement can transform into a major casualty. But the beautiful thing Haggis does with the movie is through his dialogue and music, he illustrates how beneath one’s own implicit biases lies insecurity and vulnerability.
There are those specific cases where hatred is at the center of one’s actions when attempting to disenfranchise a group of people. But in most cases, at the center of implicit bias is ignorance, insecurity, and vulnerability. Not knowing can sometimes make one feel insecure about themselves which in turn makes them feel vulnerable, inciting a fight, flight, freeze, fawn response.
In that response, a crash is born.
