crash film analysis essay

by Paul Haggis

• Crash Summary

The film opens with a commentary by Detective Graham Waters . He and his partner, Ria , have been involved in a car accident with an elderly Asian woman. Ria exits the car and exchanges a series of racially charged insults with the woman. It is revealed that the accident occurred while Waters and Ria were en route to a crime scene. Waters exits the vehicle to investigate the discovery of a “dead kid.”

The film cuts to “yesterday,” as Farhad , a Persian shop owner, and his daughter Dorri are purchasing a weapon at a gun store. Aggravated with Farhad’s indecision, the owner of the gun shop begins insulting Farhad’s race, at one point calling him “Osama.” Farhad becomes irritated with the owner’s insults, and he is ultimately escorted away from the premises. Dorri, left alone with the store owner, insists that she purchase the bullets that come “in the red box.”

Across town, Anthony and Peter , two young black men, discuss the stereotypes they face as African Americans. After noticing the discomfort of Jean Cabot as she passes them on the street, Anthony and Peter carjack Cabot and her husband, who also happens to be the Los Angeles District Attorney. Following their robbery, they call Daniel Ruiz , a Latino locksmith, to change the locks at their house. After seeing Daniel, Jean is insistent that her locks be changed again in the morning—she is worried that Daniel will give a copy of their keys to one of his “gang banger friends.” After hearing this comment, Daniel decides to leave the keys on Jean’s kitchen counter.

Waters and Ria arrive at the scene of a shooting between two drivers, and it is revealed that both shooters are undercover police officers. The dead shooter, a black male, appears to have carried a large amount of cash in his trunk at the time of his death. The surviving shooter, a white male, has previously shot and killed two other black men without legal consequence. In another sequence, LAPD Officer John Ryan calls a health insurance company on behalf of his father. After he fails to receive the answers he desires, Ryan racially insults Shaniqua Johnson , the representative on the other line.

Ryan enters his squad car, and the viewer is introduced to his partner, Officer Tom Hansen . After seeing a vehicle that looks similar to the one that has been carjacked, the two pursue the black Navigator. During their pursuit, they discover that a passenger in the car is performing a sexual act on the driver. Despite discrepancies in the vehicle’s descriptions, Ryan insists that they pull over the Navigator. As they order the couple out of the car, Cameron Thayer , a television director, cooperates, while his wife, Christine, is argumentative. Annoyed with her frustration, Ryan molests Christine during a supposed “pat-down.” The couple is let off with a warning, but Cameron and Christine get into an intense argument about Cameron’s passivity during Christine’s assault.

Arriving home after a long day of work, Daniel finds his five-year-old daughter, Lara, hiding under her bed. After Lara tells Daniel she is afraid of the gunshot she heard outside, Daniel gives her an “invisible impenetrable cloak” to protect her against all danger. The scene cuts to Anthony and Peter, who are arguing in the SUV they have carjacked. Engrossed in their debate, Anthony runs over a Korean man. The victim is severely injured, and after Anthony and Peter take a moment to argue what to do with him, they ultimately decide to drop him in front of a hospital.

Disgusted by Ryan’s behavior the night before, Officer Hansen talks to his boss, Lieutenant Dixon, about switching partners. Dixon, a black officer, is insistent that Ryan not be exposed as a racist—doing so would cost everyone in their division their jobs. In order to separate himself from Ryan, Dixon suggests that Hansen lie and claim to have “uncontrollable flatulence” so that he can ride in a one-man car.

Ryan visits Shaniqua Johnson in-person to beg for a different health plan for his father. Recognizing Ryan from his racist comments over the phone, Johnson orders to have the officer removed from her property. Before he leaves, Ryan insults Shaniqua again, calling her an affirmative action hire. Meanwhile, Daniel repairs a broken lock at Farhad’s shop. Though he fixes the lock, Daniel explains to Farhad that the door frame is broken. Farhad, who does not understand English well, thinks that Daniel has “cheated him.”

The following morning, Farhad finds that his store has been broken into and defaced with graffiti. The insurance company refuses to cover the damages, as they claim that the defective door is a result of Farhad’s negligence. Feeling that Daniel has wronged him, Farhad vows to get revenge.

Detective Waters visits his weak, elderly mother in her run-down home. She begs him to search for his missing brother, and he agrees to help. Later, Waters arrives at an LA courthouse to deliver a verdict regarding the shooting between the two undercover officers. There, his boss instructs him to not reveal the presence of the cash in the black officer’s trunk in order to put forth an image of a non-racist LAPD. Though Waters disagrees with this verdict, he understands that he will be rewarded with a job promotion if he adheres to his superior’s request.

Jean Cabot comes home and sees that her dishes remain in the dishwasher. She becomes aggravated at Maria, her Latina maid. In another part of town, Officer Ryan encounters a grave car accident. As a first responder, he crawls into the overturned vehicle and finds Christine Thayer trapped inside. Once Christine recognizes Ryan, she becomes hysterical and refuses his assistance. However, after calming and reassuring Christine, Ryan rescues her from the vehicle seconds before it explodes into flames.

Anthony and Peter attempt to carjack another vehicle, which happens to belong to Cameron Thayer. After the events of the previous night, Cameron is incredibly frustrated and combative. Against Anthony and Peter’s request, he fails to exit the car. Anthony hops into the car, and Cameron begins driving erratically. A group of police officers, led by Officer Hansen, pursue Thayer and Anthony. The passengers are ordered to exit the vehicle, and Cameron decides to step out alone. He pushes against the LAPD, but Hansen, attempting to redeem himself for the night before, defends Cameron. Thayer is ultimately let off with a warning, and Anthony remains undiscovered.

In an effort to avenge Daniel, Farhad brings his gun to the locksmith’s house. From her home’s front window, Lara watches as the situation between her father and Farhad escalates. Lara decides to jump into her father’s arms so that she can protect him with her invisible cloak. Farhad shoots as Lara enters the scene, and Daniel, his wife, and Farhad all believe that the little girl has been shot dead. However, it is revealed that Dorri’s “red box” of ammunition was actually a box of blanks. Back at his store, Farhad tells Dorri that Lara is his “guardian angel.”

At night, Peter is hitch-hiking in a deserted part of town. He is picked up by Officer Hansen, who is initially friendly to his passenger. After noticing that a Saint Christopher statuette is on Hansen’s dashboard, Peter chuckles. Hansen interprets Peter’s laughter to be directed at him, and Hansen grows increasingly aggravated. Peter reaches into his pocket to reveal that he, too, carries a Saint Christopher statuette. However, Hansen wrongly assumes that Peter is reaching for a gun, and he shoots Peter before the statuette is revealed. Hansen dumps Peter’s body on the side of the road and sets his car on fire, thus destroying all evidence of his crime. The scene circles back to the film’s opening, and Peter is revealed to be Waters’s missing brother.

Following his attempted carjacking, Anthony is taking a city bus. He passes the scene where he hit the Korean man the night before, and he notices that the keys remain in the Korean man’s ignition. He steals the van, and, upon opening the trunk, he discovers numerous Cambodian immigrants chained inside. Anthony decides to drive the car to Chinatown and set the Cambodian human trafficking victims free. After their release, Anthony passes a car crash that involves Shaniqua Johnson. As Anthony drives away, he hears the exchange of a series of racial slurs between those involved in the car accident.

Crash Questions and Answers

The Question and Answer section for Crash is a great resource to ask questions, find answers, and discuss the novel.

Anna was paired with Danielle and said she liked being her partner. She also says, ”I wonder now if Mr. Terupt knew what he was starting between me and Danielle” (37). What does she mean by this?

I litterally love these books, okay so Mr. Terupt just made a bond between Danielle and Anna when he had paired them together so they had starting talking more and more as time porgressed

Why didn't the insurance cover (Persian guy's) ruined store?

I believe the store wasn't covered because the door hadn't been fixed properly.

Why was Jean yelling at Rick in their house?

Jean yells at Rick because he doesn't take her seriously when she says she wants the locks changed.

Rick: You've had a really tough night. I think it would be best if you just went upstairs right now and... Jean: [Interrupting] And what? Wait for...

Study Guide for Crash

Crash study guide contains a biography of director Paul Haggis, quiz questions, major themes, characters, and a full summary and analysis.

• About Crash
• Character List
• Director's Influence

Essays for Crash

Crash essays are academic essays for citation. These papers were written primarily by students and provide critical analysis of Crash directed by Paul Haggis.

• The Damaging Treatment of Racism and the Assertion of Stereotypes in “Crash”

Wikipedia Entries for Crash

• Introduction

Intercultural Communication: Paul Haggis’ “Crash” Essay (Movie Review)

This research paper looks at the movie Crash of the director Paul Haggis. The film was released in 2004 and received three Academy Awards in 2005. This research draws upon mostly primary sources including articles, published reviews, and the book about intercultural communication. The aim of this paper is to highlight and describe the most important issues raised in the movie in accordance with the book. The results show that the film covers and demonstrates the social contradictions of identified themes.

“Moving at the speed of life, we are bound to collide with each other” ( Crash , n.d, para. 2). This statement is the tagline of the movie called Crash. It reflects the real world where a lot of people are living nowadays, and where they bump into each other every day in streets, parks, and shops. Some of these meetings are fleeting and not significant, while others give a variety of emotions and new acquaintances. Thus, such substantial events have a considerable impact on the people’s future. In Crash , the director Paul Haggis is focused on demonstrating several short stories, united in a few car accidents, shootings, and robberies with the focus on the theme of the place of a human in the modern world and society.

The movie is made very professionally. Despite a large number of characters and storylines, the plot develops gradually and quite logically. It allows the audience to see the interconnected networks of social relationships that draw the characters together.

The film begins with the policemen who find the corpse of a black man somewhere outside the city. Further, events go back a day ago, and the viewer watches short episodes from the life of different people living in this city. These individuals and events, happening to them, are somehow related to each other and closely intertwined.

There are four main storylines. Rick Cabot (Brendan Fraser) is the District Attorney of Los Angeles, a big boss. Nevertheless, two African-American guys, threatening him with a gun, take his car. The robbery of the District Attorney is a good story for the news media, but Rick cannot afford such a scandal because the voices of black voters are very crucial to him. The African-American policeman Graham (Don Cheadle) knows about the situation of the white policeman, but he cannot help him. He has to keep silent because prosecutors threaten his brother, who got into a bad company. The police officer John Ryan (Matt Dillon) scoffs at an African-American couple in front of his young teammate Hansen (Ryan Phillippe). The Iranian gets a weapon to defend his small shop, the only thing he has. Ironically, this gun will be pointed at the same poor immigrant. Some storylines of Crash come to their logical conclusion, the other part remains unfinished (there is a clear sense in it), but at the final culmination all the same happens – the killing of a black man. This murder connects most of the characters.

Some people say that the main subject of the movie Crash is political correctness, and due to it, the film won the Academy Award for the best picture in 2005. However, this movie is not limited by political correctness issue. The plot of Crash is focused on the numerous difficulties of coexistence in a huge multinational state. The director accentuates the idea of understanding. According to Neuliep (2015), people from different nations think differently. Indeed, sometimes it is very tough for a human of one culture to accept some habits and traditions of the completely different world because people think through categories. People use categories in the process of thinking to reduce uncertainty (Neulip, 2015). It is necessary for a human to use categories to make an inference and increase the accuracy of understanding. What is more, categorization is an essential part of intercultural communication because when people meet something or someone unfamiliar, the first thing they do is trying to compare the unfamiliar subject with the familiar one. Thus, culture is connected with the theory of uncertainty. The problem of misconception is the central theme of Crash, and Paul Haggis shows the tragic consequences of such misunderstanding.

Other issues, which are raised in the movie, are political correctness and ethnocentrism, which are directly related to intercultural communication. The movie shows how people from different cultures are under pressure, and how others oppress them. Some characters in Crash tend to offend and disadvantage members of a particular group. The brightest example is attitudes and actions towards African-American individuals. Although the United States of America is a multinational country that gathers immigrants who come to the United States to get a better life, there is a decrease in tolerance and increase in distrust in American society nowadays. The majority of people do not like foreigners, and Paul Haggis shows it in his movie. The problems of intolerance and ethnocentrism are the most burning nowadays. However, governments and different media pay a lot of attention to them. For example, the video from Globe Today (2016) demonstrates how judgmental the world is today. Tolerance is one of the most important human characteristics.

Except for political correctness, uncertainty, and ethnocentrism, one more theory is used in the movie. This theory is the theory of stereotype. Though this term is a part of categorization to some extent, it is necessary to highlight. On first glance, some characters can seem negative and primitive to the viewer. For instance, on the one hand, the Iranian is a very unfavorable character, but on the other hand, he is just an unfortunate man. The locksmith with tattoos, who looks like a truly criminal, is a quiet and peaceful family man, adoring his daughter. The young police officer, who was extremely outraged by the actions of his racist partner, saves a black TV producer from certain death. However, on the same day, he kills an African-American boy for no apparent reason. These actions are examples of controversial human nature. It is important to emphasize that there is no clear concept of good and evil in the movie. The characters are not divided into two groups: innocent and guilty people, or heroes and villains. All people are ordinary with their advantages and disadvantages, strengths and weaknesses. Their behavior is a reaction to the outer world, and their actions depend on different circumstances.

To sum up, despite the annoying performance of some artists, Crash is a deep film. The film received mostly positive reviews from such influential media sources as Washington Post, Rolling Stone, USA Today, Empire, and others. The movie Crash is completely independent work, and Paul Haggis, who is better known as a screenwriter and whose screenplay for “Million Dollar Baby” led to Academy Awards, fulfills different tasks as a director, producer, and screenwriter at the same time. The plot of Crash is vital and urgent because it reflects today’s problems. The movie demonstrates social contradictions, and it contains hurt, cruelty, and anger. Haggis emphasizes that every very person is unpredictable, and no one can know what will happen tomorrow. The movie shows that there is not any clear line between good and evil. Not everything that is done by rules and laws is good, and not all people who defy the laws are criminals. However, there is always hope and faith. It can be unseen, but kindness exists within people, even behind the destructive behavior.

Crash . (n.d.). Film info. Web.

Globe Today. (2016). I am not black, you are not white. Web.

Neuliep, J. W. (2014). Intercultural communication: A contextual approach. Sage Publication.

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IvyPanda. (2022, June 13). Intercultural Communication: Paul Haggis' "Crash". https://ivypanda.com/essays/paul-haggis-crash-movie-analysis/

"Intercultural Communication: Paul Haggis' "Crash"." IvyPanda , 13 June 2022, ivypanda.com/essays/paul-haggis-crash-movie-analysis/.

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IvyPanda . 2022. "Intercultural Communication: Paul Haggis' "Crash"." June 13, 2022. https://ivypanda.com/essays/paul-haggis-crash-movie-analysis/.

1. IvyPanda . "Intercultural Communication: Paul Haggis' "Crash"." June 13, 2022. https://ivypanda.com/essays/paul-haggis-crash-movie-analysis/.

Bibliography

IvyPanda . "Intercultural Communication: Paul Haggis' "Crash"." June 13, 2022. https://ivypanda.com/essays/paul-haggis-crash-movie-analysis/.

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Analysis of Ethical Dilemmas in The Film Crash

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Crash Movie Analysis Essay

Crash was a film that debuted in 2004. The movie told the story of various individuals and families of different ethnic backgrounds. The film showed a lot of different scenarios through the eyes of the people living in Los Angeles, California. This shows that everyone no matter race or other group identity face discrimination in their own right. The message shown was that many people of other ethnic backgrounds either face discrimination directly or acted upon discrimination as their paths cross one another.

The film was shown through the viewpoint of many characters and how they reacted to numerous events which a lot promoted discrimination or stereotyping. The film was very well put together. The audience got to see the viewpoints of discrimination through the eyes of different individuals and see their outcome. When showing the topic of discrimination it opens people’s eyes to the very same discrimination acts that they do in their daily lives . The film was convincing cause it showed real life situations and showed how everyone is tied to an event and how different parties react differently based on their ethnic identity.

The resources used was problem from the directors own experience as well as the many accounts that many people have told their experience about racial discrimination . The story connects with people because many people either went through something similar or still go through it day to day. For example the crooked racist cop stopping the black couple then sexually assaulting the black man’s wife because the officer gave the man an ultimatum to either go to jail and receive very embarrassing charges or humiliate him by saying he is sorry while the cop fondles his wife.

While the scene was going on the cop’s partner stood by and was silent during the duration on the act. The film did over emphasize the role of African-Americans and discrimination in today’s society . The other individuals played a minor role to the story or basically moved the story along but it was primarily focused on the black point of view on racism and how they deal with it. With the heavy emphasis on the black characters in the film it was an unbalanced in regards to the reactions of what the others races, those being not black or white, endure in their daily lives.

However, I think that the other poles that played a minor part in the storyline should have been brought up more. In the film the Latino male only endured discrimination after the District Attorney’s wife told her husband that she wanted the locks changed in the morning because the locksmith, the Latino male, was going to sale them to his friends. She said he would because of his ethnic background and the fact that he had tattoos which she called them “prison tattoos. ” The Persian family only got called Arabs in the movie.

With the movie debuting in 2004 the phobia of the Islamic faith and the people who follow it was still at a high because on the September 11th attack on the World Trade Center towers. The movie transition very well and it did not drag in the scenes at all, so everything moved along and the story builds without any nonsense information being thrown at me. I did wish that the movie would have brought the Middle Eastern and the Latino portion of discrimination so that they could show what the individuals go through.

I think the overemphasis of the movie, with its black versus white dynamic; it’s self-took away from their stories being featured. I also did not like that we did not get any kind of closure from Ryan Philippe’s character after he killed the black man that was riding in his car. His looked at his attire and based a quick judgment after he had already picked him up from the side of the road and also witness his former partner being discriminatory against the black couple. He just killed the guy, threw his body into the plains, burned his car, and walked off.

The film was sort of refreshing in the sense that the 90’s were almost over saturated with movies about the inner city and black people . The whole white teacher who comes to save the inner city group of students was done over and over again. So much that they even had a parody film about the saturation of inner black teen movies . The film tried to show the tales of many individuals from various backgrounds and how different events set off a chain reaction that affects people lives.

I did wish the film touched more in gender and class discrimination. Though it was lightly touched with the black couple from wealthier backgrounds were arguing about the other one not being what is considered black but I think including those could have different outcomes for the individuals in the movie but that would be cramming so much into the film or the film would be five hours long. But I just thought that those things could be talked about as well.

When talking about racism, discrimination and others it sometimes feels like it’s a competition, usually more with minorities or different genders of ethnic groups, to see who the most oppressed individual is. When speaking about these things we must talk, ask or answer any question that each side may have, not getting upset at the questions being asked or answers, state the problem, and finally come up with a solution. The listening and question parts are still what we struggle on.

Each side wants the other to see it their way and then when the questions start flying the other side of the debate gets very upset at some of the ignorance because the other side sees it one way but the other side may have never thought it to see a problem from a different angle before. The final part is also very important because without a solution all the talking will not change a thing. A solution and steps to get the solution is what needed in this debate.

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