Warning: RACISM

Sunday, April 2, 2006 » movies thought

I watched Crash earlier, and it reminded me a lot of Magnolia1, except the first half of the movie it felt like the director was sitting next to me, jabbing me in the side every ten seconds while shouting, "HEY, RACISM!" The intertwining of the cast was also really contrived, on almost a Tale of Two Cities level. Magnolia managed to weave a lot of plotlines together without ever making me go, "Oh no, it's that guy!" There's even an Aimee Mann sound-alike playing over the climactic montage.

I don't agree that it's as bad as some people say, but overall it did strike me as forced: overwrought dialogue, implausible character meetings, and a lot of blatant reminders about the movie's racism themes.

LOOK, RACISM!

1 I decided to keep the pretension down by not referring to it as "P.T. Anderson's Magnolia," although I guess this footnote cancels that out.