Sunday, 11 October 2015

Analysis of Crash

Crash is a film from 2004. It's setting is in Los angeles during the same time period and covers a two day storyline in a non linear format, starting at the end of this certain time period at a crime scene, and then going back to the begining, reaching the end to explain how events unfold to reach to scenario we saw at the very start. The film's themes involve mainly around racial issues, discrimination, and stereotyping, many of these film's characters ,which have their own seperate storylines interweaving into each other, show different type of these racial issues whether it's them being affected by prejudice, or being the ones who show signs of racism and prejudice towards others. The film shows a variety of forms of racial tension.
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 One of the biggest examples is the obviously racist and corrupt police officer who shows hostillity towards racial minorities, there is also the duo of criminals, who clearly feel like they are discriminated against because of their colour, and that white people are 'afraid' of them just because of their colour, yet the difference is that they are in fact very hostile and aggressive, holding guns and casually hijacking cars, one member of this duo clearly aswell has highly racial hostillity towards white people in particular, who claims that they should only rob white people, and only hesitates when he accidently attacks a person of black colour. This creates a dynamic where the racial tension and prejudice in the film is not completely a black and white issue (It's not just one side against another), where both the ones who feel and most likely are affected by racial descrimination are in fact ones who enforce this ideology aswell that one race is against another. The racist police officer is also an example of this, as he is given a bit of backstory to why he treats minorities the way he does because of what happened to his father. This makes this character have a lot more depth to it than just a typical racist who acts the way they do just for the malicious reasons behind it, the film further puts this character in a less completely cruel character during the end of his arc when he saves a woman from a bus wreckage. These examples of characters are both put in the position of being racially insensitive and bad people, yet at the same time we see both characters do something good in their final scenes. For the criminal he frees a group of cambodian immigrants from being sold off, and his reasons are clear to be out of pure disagreement with selling them off, as he would have recieved payment. This shows that the film perhaps puts the idea of racism as not a evil act done for evil's sake, but can be caused by something impactful that may have happened, leading to their misconceptions about a race. For the corrupt police officer, it was how he felt his father's company was lost because of certain laws past that made him lose money despite the fact that he had paid them equally, and for the criminal named Anthony, it's clear that he himself has been attacked with racism himself, being a minority race. He shows dislike for how he is treated, and perhaps acts hostile towards white people because of how he is treated himself.http://i.ytimg.com/vi/rVJRcEt4TMM/maxresdefault.jpghttp://puu.sh/kGZS1/68e40101be.jpg

The film also has some commentary on corruption, most importantly, corruption in the police. The previously mentioned racist police offer, displays how police officers may work on their own prejudice and opinions. During the very first scene with him, he pulls over a black couple, with no clear reason to do so, except he only does when he realizes was race they are, he continues to act wrongly towards them and starts treating them as a threat when there was nothing they did wrong, with the threat of making them go to prison, and it is at this point sexually perverses the female. This scene suggests the corrupt police actions that may exist, and says a lot about race too as the Police officer is white, and the couple are black, and it makes suggestions on how People in power, who are mostly white, make abuse of their power to enforce their racial descrimination. This scene in particular also shows how women are also facing potential threats of people in power, and their corrupt and aberrent actions. http://s2.dmcdn.net/GUYKO/x240-aRH.jpg

At the very end of the film, there appears to be a final message it tries to show. Throughout the film one storyline follows the partner of the racist police officer, he appears to be one of the youngest protagonist seen. After he witnesses the corrupt officer's actions on the minority couple, he shows clear disgust from his actions, and attempts and succeeds in seperating from him, so he can work on his own, this protagonist continues to show signs that he is one of the few characters who lacks the racist and prejudice issues that many other characters, and even ends up saving the same man from the couple from getting shot because of his aggression towards a pair of cops. Despite his good actions, at the end of the film, he gives one a previous character who is black a ride in his car, despite this character's friendly character towards him, the officer takes his laughing at hostillity, and ends up shooting and killing him thinking he was taking out a gun, when he wasn't. This final scene shows how the prejudice that he showed no signs of having throughout the whole film he had now taken on, this may have been due to all the racist actions done by others around him, like his previous partner, as this character looked young, the film's message may be trying to say how prejudice actions can influence others, and if they continue they will spread to future generations.http://puu.sh/kGZVD/16196d8a92.jpg

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