Evaluate: is pleasing because gives us hope. Even though his life is hard the love he has for his daughter and the fact they magically don’t get shot and killed is like the spoonful of sugar that makes the other home truths more palatable.
I do not believe that the principal job of a film is to be pleasing to its audience. While there are genres of films that do this, slapstick male bonding fraternity movies, cookie cutter romantic comedies or slasher flicks, not all films are purely for entertainment and some of the best films are confronting, disturbing or thought provoking: definitely not pleasing. Paul Haggis’ “Crash” sits somewhere between the two. It stirs up emotions and shows us hard truths about ourselves; the good guy doesn’t necessarily win in the end, but there are elements of careful scripting and sweet storylines that keep the audience happy so as not to alienate them from the message the director is trying to show.
The most uncomfortable scene in the movie is when Officers Ryan and Hansen pull over the Thayers on their way home from a night out. Ryan, a character who is made out to be a racist, misogynistic man, takes his own personal frustrations out on Christine (a wealthy black woman) by sexually interfering with her on the side of the road in front of her husband and his partner. Neither Christine nor her husband had done anything to deserve this treatment and her husband just stood and watched, feeling impotent and frightened that if he protested he would be arrested. The emotional fallout from this incident, with Christine justifiably feeling like she had been sacrificed for her husband’s safety and __________ carrying the anger of a man who had to stand helpless while his mate was abused, nearly cost them their marriage and started them thinking about what life is really like for black people.
THis interaction between John Ryan and Christine becomes even more upsetting during the climactic, central ‘Crash’ scene when Ryan has to save Christine from a car about to explode. She doesn’t want to be touched by him, even to save her life, which shows him how much of an impact he has had on her life. While Ryan does pull her from the car and risk his life to do so, the audience isn’t given a satisfying resolution for their brief relationship. The scene ends with Ryan on his knees is a pose of supplication while Christine is led off for medical attention. There are looks exchanged between the two but no dialogue that gives us closure. We don’t know if she has forgiven him, if he has realised what he has really done and will change his ways, or if she is now determined to press charges. This lack of resolution is not pleasing to a modern audience as we prefer all our lose ends tied up.
There was a lot of intervention by the director in order to show this relationship and also to leave it open ended. From their first meeting we were set up to feel sympathetic to Christine and revile Ryan. While this is familiar and therefore largely pleasing to an audience (to hate the bad guy and feel sorry for the poor abused woman) there is a feeling of having the rug pulled out from underneath you when the relationship isn’t resolved. In the abuse scene the lighting is kept dark and the scene is lit largely by streetlights. This gives an appropriately sombre air. The camera tracks Ryan’s hands as he fondles Christines body, a technique that fills most viewers with uncomfortable revulsion. Luckily the camera pulls away from her body as Ryan gets worse but it then closely focuses on her face as she is entered by him. The expression on her face shows anger, hurt, desperation and fear. The camera then cuts to a close up on Ryan’s face. He just looks angry. The juxtaposition between the two gives the audience a feeling of intruding on a private moment, of being a voyeur who doesn’t want to watch but can’t turn away. We just hope it gets better. That horrible feeling of uncomfortable voyeurism returns in the crash scene when Christine realises it is Ryan that is in the car with her and trying to save her. She panics and even though the camera is at a canted angle and handheld, because we are positioned to see her from Ryan’s point of view we can see the terror on her face. The shock is that the terror is over Ryan, not the prospect of dying. The feeling of displeasure intensifies after Christine and Ryan are out of the car and on their way to safety. We are again positioned from Ryan’s point of view as the camera action slows down and we get a lingering shot of Christine’s face as she is leaning on an ambulance officer. She looks hurt and confused. To end the scene there is a ‘hero shot’ of Ryan on his knees. The use of this shot is trying to position us to believe that Ryan is redeemed but the lack of verbal discussion leaves the incident unresolved and unfinished. The director leaves us to make up our own minds about Ryan’s guilt or innocence and this is not a pleasurable feeling – it is thought provoking and open to interpretation.
This relationship is a very powerful one but it is not pleasing. The director trusts the audience to come to their own conclusion which is very intelligent on his part but does not make for easy viewing. It is this intense but brief snapshots of people’s foibles and the search into their inner workings that make the film worth viewing but it is uncomfortable when our own prejudices are held up for scrutiny.
Ryan’s partner, Hansen is set up to be the opposite of Ryan. Not only does he look like the stereotypical hero, with his blonde hair, impressive physique and big blue eyes (compared to Ryan’s darkness) but he is horrified by Ryan’s actions in the scene where Ryan molests Christine. He is clearly disturbed by this and other incidences of racism that he witnesses and goes to his commanding officer to ask for a transfer to another partner. We, the audience feel for Hansen as he is humiliated by the officer and then is forced to say he has a problem with flatulence in order to get rid of Ryan as his partner. At first viewing, the audience is comforted and pleased that there is such a sympathetic character but this is to be torn down later in the film and then when really analysing Hansen’s actions. At the end of the film we are shown Hansen picking up a black man, Peter, while driving home. This appears to be an act of charity. But as the scene goes on a disagreement erupts between Hansen and Peter and Hansen’s racial prejudices can be seen more clearly. It culminates when Hansen tells Peter to get his hands out of his pockets as Hansen suspects Peter has a gun. Peter doesn’t obey quickly enough so Hansen shoots him dead and then dumps his body on the side of the road. The character that we have felt sympathetic towards and viewed as a genuinely good person is actually a murderer who tries to cover up his crime. This is not pleasant for the viewer but it is thought-provoking and uncomfortable. His actions cause us to examine his previous actions and realise that Hansen is at best a week character and at worst is inherently racist himself.
The director uses various film techniques to manipulate the viewer and set us up for an unpleasant but revealing surprise because we have misjudged Hansen so seriously. The most obvious of these techniques is the film structure itself. The film actually starts at the end with the discovery of the dead body of Peter. We know that he has been murdered but do not know who did it. The rest of the film is actually a flashback where we are introduced to various characters and then led to the final conclusions about their guilt and innocence. Because we are lulled into a false sense of security about what type of person would be a killer, we never suspect that Hansen could have it in him. He seems to be such an ‘every man’. This use of flashbacks actually shows us that if you scratch the surface anybody could do the unforgivable. The use of two shots also set us up to revere Hansen. In the scene after Hansen has gotten rid of Ryan as a partner they have a brief confrontation. There is a two shot of Hansen looking virtuous and relieved to be rid of Ryan while Ryan just looks vicious. Ryan says “Just wait until you’ve been on the job long enough and you’ll start to see things as they really are.” Hansen appears to take the high road and doesn’t reply. This juxtaposes the two characters and leads us to believe that one is right, one is wrong, and that things are black and white. This initial setting up of a dichotomy is pleasant for the viewer as we understand moral absolutes but when we realise that Hansen is actually the worse of the two then any pleasant feelings are destroyed. We are left to examine our own prejudices.
Hansen is not the pleasant character that we first believe. After he shoots Peter, in which initially appears to a terrible misjudgement we are then forced to look at his other actions. He didn’t stop Ryan when he was hurting Christine. He didn’t report Ryan for it. He didn’t stand up for other officers when Ryan was racially abusing them behind their backs. Hansen didn’t do anything to really help anyone else – he only asked for a transfer because he didn’t want to work with Ryan. And in the end he was so quick to suspect Peter that he shot him. When all Peter was going to do was show him his St Christopher. Because Hansen is at first viewing a ‘nice’ character when he actually does something terrible the audience has to re-evaluate what ‘nice’ means and to realise that prejudices are not just on the surface of people – some can hide it better than others. It is not pleasant to have to examine our own positioning and think about whether we would be any stronger than Hansen: especially when we realise the answer is no.
On the other hand if I film is all about confrontation then the danger is that any message will get lost. People tire quickly of being preached at and many look at films as a way to escape for a bit. “Crash” has characters that we do like and want to succeed in order to keep us interested and happy. The relationship between Daniel and his daughter is very pleasing because it is clear that he loves her so much. We all want to be loved unconditionally and yearn for the affection that is so clear between them. This relationship takes what could otherwise be a bleak movie and gives it more of a feelgood factor.
Daniel is the one character that most people like all along. While he appears to be a gangster in the beginning it is extremely quickly established that he is not. We can also feel proud of ourselves as an audience for liking him as he is definitely costumed in a way that is threatening to most people. Daniel wears baggy jeans, hoodies and has visible tattoos that most people would assume to be gang tattoos. He looks like a hood. Jean Cabot treats him like a hood after he changes the locks on her doors. She is a rich snob who judges everyone to be lesser than her and within his hearing she says “your amigo in there is going to sell our keys to one of his homeys” to her husband. Her prejudices are showing but because it is immediately made clear that she misjudges him, we as the audience feel proud that we can see through the costuming. Daniel has moved his daughter away from an area where there are gangs in order to give her the best life possible. When she is still scared that bullets may get her he tells her about his invisible cloak that will protect her from all harm. He ceremonially takes the invisible cloak off himself puts the cloak on her and tells her that she is now protected. The cloak is a symbol of not just how much he loves her but that he is wrapping her in the love that they share. It holds them together and makes us feel secure and warm ourselves.
The only time his warm relationship and our pleased reaction to it is tested is when Farhad goes to shoot Daniel but because his daughter believes she is invulnerable she throws herself in front of her father to protect him. But again we are left feeling pleased because there is no injury to either of them. This reinforces our faith in the idea that harm shouldn’t come to good people. Even though his life is hard the love he has for his daughter and the fact they magically don’t get shot and killed is like the spoonful of sugar that makes the other home truths more palatable.
While movies should not focus merely on pleasing their audience it is true that if a film is in no way pleasing then people will not watch it. Our own lives have enough darkness in them that we need some relief along the way and films should be uplifting in some way. But the flip side is also true. There are films purely for mindless entertainment and they certainly have their place in our world, but film is a medium that can reach so many and show us so much. It is a very powerful medium that combines the pictures meaning more than a thousand words and the dialogue and expression that also takes place in real life. I believe that films should have a meaning and a message if we want to progress as a society and any storylines or characters that are pleasing are only there to make the message more palatable.
by
aksmith2 (student)
