People keep getting disturbed by the juxtaposition of "violence" with sex, but think about it.
This isn't Hostel.
There isn't really any violence directly between human beings.
The violence by human beings against human beings is mediated through automobiles.
In fact, many of the interactions between human beings are mediated by cars, or take place in cars.
This isn't really a film about violence and sex, but about technology and how it's affecting how we communicate.
Take this screwed up thread.
What the anonymity of the internet does to human interactions is well-documented, in literature and here in this post.
The internet didn't exist at the time the novel was written, but Ballard was sensitive to the sliding nature of human interaction as a result of technology, and cars were a suitable means for communicating his ideas.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0115964/board/flat/91135461?p=2
~Comment regarding "Crash" a film by David Cronenberg
#1
Additional post so it can get past the Woofer character limit:
I don't think this movie is shallow at all. I think it's one of the best movies about addiction out there.
This movie is not about sex nor carcrashes. Since carcrashes is a really weird fetish, it only makes it clearer that we are not supposed to like it.
And it makes it easier to study the addiction itself.
The CONCEPT of addiction (to whatever it may be) A movie about an ordinary addiction like drugs or alcohol wouldn't have been as effective I think. Since these addictions have physical aspects as well, (the body needs more drugs or alcohol because of the abstinence), so it would've taken the focus off what this is really about.
This movie is more about the EMPTYNESS these people feel inside and how they go to extremes to do something new that will excite them or feel alive.
I thought the gay scene was a brilliant touch as well.
And I don't think spaders character was supposed to be homosexual either, it was just to show that he's willing to push himself further and further towards the things that scare him the most, in order to feel alive.
When he's in bed with his girl earlier in the movie she suggests he'd do it with vaughn and he says "no" that he doesn't want to, then later he does it anyway.
Spader walks around with a pretty bored face during most of this movie, like nothing shocks him.
#2
You know, I think is actually an interesting point about this movie. Ballard and Catherine seem to have it all - but they're still disaffected. Even Vaughan once had a prosperous background before sinking into his morose lifestyle. These aren't drop-outs, they're people who has found no pleasure from previous lifes of success and excess.
So the point that they're "despicable people" might well carry some water. That is if you look at them from the perspective of societal norms. Who doesn't want money, who doesn't want a beautiful wife, a good career. Yet it's not enough.
Many people cling to religion to give meaning to their lives beyond other more worldly concerns - but for the people in Crash it's something else. A yearning to feel, and to connect with the things around them in a animalistic - yet spiritual - way.
Selfish? Perhaps. Repugnant - no. Despicable? No. So I think your comment has some validity. These are hard people to love, to sympathize with, but it is possible if you allow yourself to fall as deeply as they have.
I must say, I find them dar from "subhuman". Too often we jump on "different" and label it in extreme terms. Ones life is ones own responsibility. And whom are these people hurting, ultimately? They're not remourseless because they're searching, they're not looking back, they've done that and found it to be lacking.
#3
This is a typical example of what is wrong with modern cinema audiences.
Films have to bash them over the head for them to get it. What was clever about this film is it's subtlety.
It is so subtle, lunkheads don't get it.
The sex, the crashes, the car show were all superficial, instinctual, visual elements use to titillate and distract, while the profound cerebral elements were secreted in.
Beneath that superficial level, the film was a disturbing voyeuristic peek into the intricate and delicate psyches of people, some of them very damaged inside and out.
This was more about obsession, fixation, deviance, perversion, disfigurement, fetishism and a host of other mental side effects that can come with a traumatic event, some of the ways that a brain can warp, if trauma isn't given psychiatric, as well as medical attention.
These people are so traumatized that they are in a vicious cycle of sex and death, unable to return to normality or restrain themselves from engaging suicidal behavior that they know will eventually kill them.
Why? Because they believe they should have died in the original crash they survived.
How do I know? Because I was hit by a tractor trailer and lived to tell. Although I received the proper care, and didn't degenerate like these people, I certainly can relate to their belief that they should have died in the crash, as well as their sexual obsession (it's not just about thrill sex, it's about equating sexuality to feeling alive and whole again).
It's actually a necessary part of the process, one of the after effects. I think Cronenberg was dead on in his display of the feelings of crash victims, and probably car-crash fetishists as well. For me, it was not an easy, pretty film to watch, but I was grateful he made it, if only to see how bad it could have been, and how well I've recovered.
This isn't Hostel.
There isn't really any violence directly between human beings.
The violence by human beings against human beings is mediated through automobiles.
In fact, many of the interactions between human beings are mediated by cars, or take place in cars.
This isn't really a film about violence and sex, but about technology and how it's affecting how we communicate.
Take this screwed up thread.
What the anonymity of the internet does to human interactions is well-documented, in literature and here in this post.
The internet didn't exist at the time the novel was written, but Ballard was sensitive to the sliding nature of human interaction as a result of technology, and cars were a suitable means for communicating his ideas.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0115964/board/flat/91135461?p=2
~Comment regarding "Crash" a film by David Cronenberg
#1
Additional post so it can get past the Woofer character limit:
I don't think this movie is shallow at all. I think it's one of the best movies about addiction out there.
This movie is not about sex nor carcrashes. Since carcrashes is a really weird fetish, it only makes it clearer that we are not supposed to like it.
And it makes it easier to study the addiction itself.
The CONCEPT of addiction (to whatever it may be) A movie about an ordinary addiction like drugs or alcohol wouldn't have been as effective I think. Since these addictions have physical aspects as well, (the body needs more drugs or alcohol because of the abstinence), so it would've taken the focus off what this is really about.
This movie is more about the EMPTYNESS these people feel inside and how they go to extremes to do something new that will excite them or feel alive.
I thought the gay scene was a brilliant touch as well.
And I don't think spaders character was supposed to be homosexual either, it was just to show that he's willing to push himself further and further towards the things that scare him the most, in order to feel alive.
When he's in bed with his girl earlier in the movie she suggests he'd do it with vaughn and he says "no" that he doesn't want to, then later he does it anyway.
Spader walks around with a pretty bored face during most of this movie, like nothing shocks him.
#2
You know, I think is actually an interesting point about this movie. Ballard and Catherine seem to have it all - but they're still disaffected. Even Vaughan once had a prosperous background before sinking into his morose lifestyle. These aren't drop-outs, they're people who has found no pleasure from previous lifes of success and excess.
So the point that they're "despicable people" might well carry some water. That is if you look at them from the perspective of societal norms. Who doesn't want money, who doesn't want a beautiful wife, a good career. Yet it's not enough.
Many people cling to religion to give meaning to their lives beyond other more worldly concerns - but for the people in Crash it's something else. A yearning to feel, and to connect with the things around them in a animalistic - yet spiritual - way.
Selfish? Perhaps. Repugnant - no. Despicable? No. So I think your comment has some validity. These are hard people to love, to sympathize with, but it is possible if you allow yourself to fall as deeply as they have.
I must say, I find them dar from "subhuman". Too often we jump on "different" and label it in extreme terms. Ones life is ones own responsibility. And whom are these people hurting, ultimately? They're not remourseless because they're searching, they're not looking back, they've done that and found it to be lacking.
#3
This is a typical example of what is wrong with modern cinema audiences.
Films have to bash them over the head for them to get it. What was clever about this film is it's subtlety.
It is so subtle, lunkheads don't get it.
The sex, the crashes, the car show were all superficial, instinctual, visual elements use to titillate and distract, while the profound cerebral elements were secreted in.
Beneath that superficial level, the film was a disturbing voyeuristic peek into the intricate and delicate psyches of people, some of them very damaged inside and out.
This was more about obsession, fixation, deviance, perversion, disfigurement, fetishism and a host of other mental side effects that can come with a traumatic event, some of the ways that a brain can warp, if trauma isn't given psychiatric, as well as medical attention.
These people are so traumatized that they are in a vicious cycle of sex and death, unable to return to normality or restrain themselves from engaging suicidal behavior that they know will eventually kill them.
Why? Because they believe they should have died in the original crash they survived.
How do I know? Because I was hit by a tractor trailer and lived to tell. Although I received the proper care, and didn't degenerate like these people, I certainly can relate to their belief that they should have died in the crash, as well as their sexual obsession (it's not just about thrill sex, it's about equating sexuality to feeling alive and whole again).
It's actually a necessary part of the process, one of the after effects. I think Cronenberg was dead on in his display of the feelings of crash victims, and probably car-crash fetishists as well. For me, it was not an easy, pretty film to watch, but I was grateful he made it, if only to see how bad it could have been, and how well I've recovered.
