And the Oscar goes to ...............CRASH

When I first heard of Crash and about it's huge cast (remember Jon Stewart's joke on Oscar night) I was worried that the material might be rushed and there wouldn't be enough time for the different issues related to racism namely political, crime, jobs and so on. When I watched the movie i realized how shallow my perception of racism was. The problem is not out there but in our minds. Prejudices are in our subconscious. When you watch Crash you see the DA's wife (Sandra Bullock)holding her husband's arm when she passes two black men, you see the gun shop owner not ready to sell the gun to the arab and in the most well written role of the movie you see the white cop(Matt Dillon) molesting the wife of a black TV serial director(Terrence Howard), reason:she is black. You see example after example of how a victim on one day becomes the victimizer on the other. You see how similar we are in our daily lives in terms of the problems we face and the insecurities we have. We see two cops, one white one black suffering everyday because their parents are in such great pain. We see how the studio boss asks the director to change the script because the black actor spoke proper English and that's not how blacks are supposed to speak. We see a mexican locksmith being humiliated by a white housewife and being accused of being a hoodlum only because he is mexican and has tatoos all over his body. It's a different story that this locksmith goes home and finds his own daughter hiding under her bed because she heard gunshots. We see the black car thief angry with everything that is white sometimes for no reason at all. We see the insecurity of the arab shopkeeper as he feels everyone is out to cheat him. All he wanted was some control over his life. But the most breathtaking scene of the movie for me was the car crash when the same cop who molested the lady has to save her the next day. Moments captured so brilliantly on camera. The movie itself completed for a budget of $6.5 million was a triumph for Don Cheadle who persuaded most of the stars to work for much lesser than their actual pay. The writer director Paul Haggis also wrote Million Dollar Baby makes a great point when he shows how life comes a full circle and how even the most broad minded can give in to prejudices as shown in the car shooting scene towards the end. There is just so much to see and feel in this movie but the most important part is the thinking that we do afterwards. Be it racism or casteism(in India) the prejudices are just so common among us, ingrained in us. We don't even notice them most of them. This is easily the best movie I have watched this year, yet to watch Brokeback Mountain but even if that turns out to be outstanding I would not grudge Crash the oscar it so truly deserves. Thumbs up ten times over.................