Crashing into lives

“We’re always behind so much metal and glass. Think we miss that touch so much, we crash into each other just to feel something”. Detective Graham Waters (Don Cheadle ) in "Crash".

Paul Haggis' masterpiece features an ensemble cast and looks at the lives of a handful of LA residents whose lives cross each other in the matter of a night. It’s impossible to watch the movie without thinking “What would I do in this situation?”. And if you can answer that while seeing this brilliant movie, you’d also probably conclude that it’s so damn easy to pass judgment on others from your very own comfortable ivory tower. Or your car. Or your house. Prejudices are easy to form and virtually impossible to break.

A comparison with life in Bombay seems opportunistic but perhaps might not be entirely inappropriate. Think about it. How many times have you cursed corruption and at the same time broken a signal while rushing home to be with your family. And bribed the cop who caught you. Or bought your flashy, new car with a Thane registration to avoid paying a higher price, while shaking your head at the horrendous state of the roads. Or bought tickets in black for that that must-watch film, and seethed in rage at rising crime in the city. Hey, come on you’re entitled to a good time, right ? And hell, if there’s a loophole in tax laws, you are going to use it, right ? After all, like every honest, salary-earning, hard-working Bombayite, you pay your taxes and are entitled to a good life.

“Crash” doesn’t deal with these issues. But it makes you think. Dealing with diverse characters and various aspects of their lives, it puts you at the centre of it all. There are some gut-wrenching scenes that shake your senses and make you wonder- “What if it happened to me”. Watch the movie for the performances, depth of characters and the sheer thrill of the ride.

And watch it before the next brain-dead, retard, intellectually-challenged, creatively-deprived, imbecile, fool and poor excuse for a Hindi film director sees the DVD and steals the idea for the next Emran Hashmi, Rakhi Samant, Irrfan Khan starrer. Hey, its so much easier now yaar – call Sarvodaya, Shemaroo, etc for the latest DVD, copy the damn scenes, thrown in good skin and item songs and you got your next flick to hit the multiplexes. The good part is that I doubt these crap movies make money. The bad part is people still make them, and people still watch them.