Crash

Crash

1996
Romance, Drama
1h 40m
The immediate subject matter of Crash is the strange lure of the auto collision, provoking as it does the human fascination with death and the tendency to eroticize danger. Most motorists will slow down to stare at the scene of a collision; they may feel their pulses quickening and become exquisitely aware of the fragility of their own bodies. The characters of Crash carry this awareness a step further, cherishing and nurturing it. For them, a car collision is a sexual turn-on, and a jolting life-force they come to crave. (Fine Line Features)
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Crash

1996
Romance, Drama
1h 40m
Your probable score
Avg Percentile 53.19% from 3376 total ratings

Ratings & Reviews

(3376)
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Rated 13 Aug 2008
100
99th
Cronenberg's masterpiece. An ultra-controlled, fetishistic look at a group of selfish, despicable people going to extreme and destructive lengths to feel alive. The cold eroticism and aesthetics are incredible, all the shiny metal and leather against deteriorating bodies and scarred flesh. The performances are equally beautiful, sad and disturbingly empty. Misunderstood and despised by pretty much everyone, which is a shame.
Rated 28 Jan 2007
65
51st
This flick was just ok, but it made the chick I watched it with super horny and I got laid out of it, so *thumbs up* I'd say it's the perfect date movie.
Rated 21 Jun 2008
72
12th
Skillfully done with some nice moments but all in all a slightly disappointing treatment of the book. More could be done visually and there's some ridiculously inappropriate music at times. Stretches the boundaries of what Hollywood accepts but not nearly radical enough for the novel. Ballard says cars, violence and politics are pornography and pornography is today's society. Cronenberg subverts this into a fetish shared by a small group of weirdos which is a wasted opportunity.
Rated 23 Jul 2009
47
5th
Worthless and completely uninteresting. The dialogue is especially ridiculous and of course the premise is as well, but the film's biggest failure is how absolutely mundane and boring it is. Oh, Cronenberg certainly tries to shock with all the sex and car crashes but, beyond some faint moral disgust, it elicits nothing because of how terribly constructed the entire affair is.
Rated 14 Aug 2007
83
74th
Between Crash and A History of Violence, "Not having sex with David Cronenberg" moved up to life goal #1.
Rated 22 Nov 2009
86
82nd
I was intrigued by the movie's refusal to attempt to explain why these characters act the way they do. At first I struggled to find motivation for their strange actions, but I gradually began to realize the effort was futile. I eventually gave in and just let Cronenberg take me where we wanted. The result is a movie filled with emotionally-distant people who seek out sexual pleasure in ways I will never understand, and a movie that has stayed with me for days. Quite intriguing.
Rated 24 May 2010
57
33rd
Sexually dysfunctional people being sexually dysfunctional. That's great and all, but where is the story and reason to care? Atmosphere is decent though, I'll give it that, and I liked the glimpses of Cronenberg's body horror themes.
Rated 23 Dec 2014
65
48th
There are all kinds of fetishes, but the only thing less sexually appealing than a car crash is Elia Koteas. To analogize this, if the road were Koteas' face it would have a lot of pot holes.
Rated 28 Apr 2009
3
74th
Ice cold and perhaps vulgar, but not stupid and speculative, like many of it's critics seem to think. As usual with Cronenberg, the focus is on technology's impact on man, the fragile human body and distorted sexuality. It is not about car crash fetishism. At least not in my mind.
Rated 31 Jul 2009
15
16th
Stupid and disappointing. Really pretentious. One Cronenberg movie I truly hate.
Rated 12 Nov 2014
83
86th
Completely singular and uncompromising vision. You may not enjoy it but you have to admire its conviction. Stylistic while maintaining a clinical distance to its subject. Appropriate in a story about people desperate to connect with each other in a modern world. Cronenberg might be the best director in maintaining his focus when dealing with sex & violence. These scenes come out completely unashamed of the subject yet totally cool & surgical. A great film although tough one to truly like.
Rated 23 Jul 2020
6
34th
Interesting seems like a good way of saying I didn't hate the film but it wasn't my cup of tea. Would've enjoyed it more had Cronenberg focused more on the psychological state of mind of survivors following a life-threatening accident rather than their recurrent sexual escapades, which frankly becomes boring, even unintentionally funny, after a while. Give me some good ol' body horror with a tinge of sexual nastiness instead.
Rated 20 Jun 2021
85
92nd
Unforgettable. The concept is alluring and I give bonus points to films that explore provocative boundaries, though Crash gets repetitive at times with similar scenarios. I'd have liked to see fewer setups but more drawn out erotic teasing. There's something for everyone except maybe asexuals. Ultimately, the plot never really went anywhere. Fav scene: giving a demonstration/reconstruction of the James Dean crash.
Rated 30 Mar 2007
43
31st
Cronenberg's love of all things bizarre must have driven him to make this borderline soft porn flick about car-crash-ophiles that doesn't have all that much of a point. Crash isn't bad, strictly speaking. It's just that, well, it's static and lacks development and isn't as fascinating to most of us as it obviously is to Cronenberg.
Rated 14 Aug 2007
61
17th
It's a great movie to *think* about but not an enjoyable one to watch. Still, good material for term papers. Mad props for originality and Elias Koteas' creepy Vaughan.
Rated 28 Nov 2007
58
18th
I usually like Cronenberg, and this is well done for what it is, I suppose. But "what it is" is very unpleasant and not all that enjoyable.
Rated 13 Nov 2008
95
92nd
All the smart people put this movie down, but I thought it was brilliant.
Rated 13 Dec 2008
5
44th
I hesitate to call this a good film but it is interesting, albeit a bit insane. Not for everyone but that's true with all Cronenberg.
Rated 09 Nov 2009
79
64th
Cronenberg's are always psychologically complex, and this is no exception. As is often his modus operandi, he takes human behavior to absurdist extremes to reveal unpleasant universalities. Don't we all kind of get off on car crashes? There are other themes explored as well, some of them rather undeveloped, but they make interesting food for thought. Of course, a lot of it is terribly silly, but most Cronenberg is.
Rated 27 Mar 2010
5
56th
Simultaneously interesting and tiresome. Probably would work better as a short, instead it feels like it keeps repeating itself.
Rated 24 Jun 2010
70
57th
Not really a story and absent of any kind of message, but intriguing nonetheless.
Rated 18 Jul 2010
90
78th
I think one has to read the J.G. Ballard book that this film was based on to truly understand the tone of it. Ballard's intent in his book was to present sex in a manner devoid of eroticism, machinelike, without any real titillation. He wanted to highlight the obsession with technology that the current generation is so fixated on. I read the book before the movie and thought it captured Ballard's message and tone incredibly accurately, so this film is high on my list.
Rated 27 Oct 2010
30
18th
James Spader has sex with someone's scar, her SCAR! I was never going to enjoy this movie!
Rated 11 Feb 2012
100
99th
How can I explain the fragile magic in exploring an obsession? The explosive triangle (which sounds so much better in Hebrew): cars - sex - death. We don't understand the characters, we don't need to - a sensation of drifting smoke and the horror visions of erotic twisted metal parts explains themselves fairly well. You enter a world which in an ugly scar is a turn-on and marriage survives through bloody tragedies alone. And you breathe-in the smell of rotten dysfunction, and you believe.
Rated 11 Feb 2013
95
98th
Sexy and repulsive, refined and crude, Cronenberg's car porn film is a gut-wrenching, almost wordless study of pleasure through pain -- or pain through pleasure -- in its constantly horny, crazy and rough way that it addresses the human body as a mechanic sex machine. The car wash sequence is one of the most impressive in the canadian director's body of work.
Rated 05 Feb 2017
70
44th
Hardly a pleasure to watch, which is not surprising given the themes and Cronenberg's obsession with creating uncomfortable body-related scenes. But the lack of any warmth to this film and, despite the constant erotica, closeness to the characters it actually becomes a bit of a chore to sit through.
Rated 17 Oct 2017
90
92nd
There's two types of people: those who find Crash horny, and those who admit they find it horny. A lot is made of how weird and fucked up this film is but I've always found it relatable, warm, empathetic and yes, pretty damn horny. James Spader is my favourite wide-eyed naivete protag, and these people are my people. Let's all just make out. It's a classic.
Rated 30 Nov 2020
58
16th
I suddenly realise that "queasy" makes appearances in many of my Cronenberg reviews, and here we go again - this is an icy cold, queasy exploration of sexual fetishism that frustratingly never digs into the motivations of its intriguing array of characters to explain why they adopt the behaviour they do - without added context, this feels more like a softcore porno than a compelling drama. A great cast performing at the top of their game (Koteas is a first-rate slimeball) maintain interest.
Rated 06 Dec 2020
84
68th
incredibly horny film, loses the plot in the second half but makes up for it with the steamiest car crash sex you'll find
Rated 17 Jan 2022
8
98th
maybe the best addiction movie, and relatable as a metaphor for how everybody i date is a walking talking car crash and i kind of like it that way. relatable to someone obsessed with air crashes who's probably heard every harrowing cockpit recording out there and could quote several by heart. people who don't think this movie's hot as hell are probably zombies who've never had good sex in their lives--granted they'll be well-adjusted respectable zombies who'll live a long and normal existence.
Rated 22 May 2022
65
42nd
As a kid, this was basically sold to me as pornography with car crashes. It all sounded so lurid. Well, 26 years later, I finally watched it. I can't even imagine watching this as a preteen. May have sent me down a dark path. However, despite all the nudity and sex, it's incredibly unerotic. What was I expecting from Cronenberg? It was so clinical. I did not enjoy watching this, but I don't think I was supposed to, so that's not a criticism.
Rated 17 Nov 2022
80
81st
better than porn
Rated 10 Feb 2024
100
99th
A perfect movie (yah, I said that) that lives in the tension (and friction) between violent car crashes and sex scenes full of impossible tenderness. But make it really weird and non-normative. It's a film where you can see everybody's wounds and they can see each other's wounds, which leads to vulnerability and intimacy.
Rated 17 Jan 2007
95
95th
Crash, uma das obras-primas do David Cronenberg, estreava há 25 anos no Canadá. Nem imaginam o quanto eu esperei por esse filme em alta definição, meu gosto foi profundo quando a Versátil anunciou o seu blu-ray, curiosamente estou com ele há meses aqui em casa, mas queria revê-lo numa data de aniversário, esse dia finalmente chegou, vi uma vez na imersão e revi em seguida com comentários em áudio. Também acho o livro do Ballard uma obra-prima. Blu-ray Versátil.
Rated 14 Feb 2007
75
76th
Superior to Haggis' Crash in every way.
Rated 26 Feb 2007
60
62nd
Very strange and disturbing film.
Rated 25 Mar 2007
70
58th
I thought this one was alright, but I didn't think it was Oscar-best-film worthy. Whatever, I guess that's why I don't work for the Academy...
Rated 11 Jun 2007
80
77th
Haunting exploration into human's sexual nature.
Rated 10 Jul 2007
4
83rd
Great Cronenberg. Another exploration of his favorite subject: hermetically sealed secret organizations that exist on the fringes of society. Still blew my mind when people started talking about Crash as a movie about black people and Los Angeles.
Rated 14 Aug 2007
46
28th
Cronenberg really explores sex and violence, or rather his opinion of the relation between sex and violence, in this film. It's really hard to definitely say whether or not one will like it. I think the real deciding factor is whether or not you're a Cronenberg fan. If you are you'll like it, if not then chances are you won't.
Rated 14 Aug 2007
50
43rd
Have not seen this since 1996: perhaps time to give it another chance.
Rated 14 Aug 2007
85
50th
Strange but brilliant in many ways. A cold, icy movie.
Rated 14 Aug 2007
87
94th
Disturbing in the best sense
Rated 14 Aug 2007
80
52nd
Wierd, but interesting.
Rated 21 Aug 2007
35
35th
One of the worst movies by one of my Favourite actors, James Spader gets his kinks off car crashes.
Rated 14 Oct 2007
37
2nd
pretentious crap
Rated 16 Nov 2007
25
24th
feitshy, bizarre film. eh.
Rated 02 Mar 2008
67
47th
# 652
Rated 15 May 2008
75
48th
Not great -- methinks you should stick to J G Ballard's book.
Rated 21 Jun 2008
9
1st
Almost unbelievably stupid. It's one extremely photogenic car crash after another, generally followed by an exposed tit, then sex, or some such ridiculousness. If there actually exists a tiny subset of the population that finds car crashes to be so highly erotic, an interview or two would have been a lot more illuminating.
Rated 07 Jul 2008
30
6th
Stopped being interesting after 10 minutes. After that it was the same point being spoonfed to me over and over again.
Rated 13 Jul 2008
59
30th
Uncmfortable.
Rated 25 Sep 2008
90
95th
Odd movie, odd filmmaker, odd book. NUFF said
Rated 26 Oct 2008
66
45th
WHAT
Rated 27 Oct 2008
75
59th
Jesus Christ just thinking about this movie makes me queasy.
Rated 16 Nov 2008
68
72nd
good movie
Rated 18 Dec 2008
80
72nd
Excellent drama that intertwines many different lives. Very glad it won the oscar that year.
Rated 19 Dec 2008
62
24th
761
Rated 26 Jan 2009
75
67th
Powerful in its studied lack of passion. It succeeds in recreating the cold, mechanical tone of the novel, but the faithfulness to the original dialogue gives this a clumsy and awkward feel at times.
Rated 01 May 2009
70
23rd
I still don't really get it after watching it 3 times...
Rated 17 Jul 2009
63
25th
Cronenberg delivers the usual mash-up of twisted sex and "healthy" dose of violence in dramatic and disturbing fashion (literrally). Essentially a combination of Basic Instinct and Secretary with an NC-17 rating. intriguing, but not in a good way.
Rated 19 Jul 2009
80
26th
Good, if a little meandering.
Rated 23 Jul 2009
75
79th
Feeding of the parts of humanity most of us want to supress.
Rated 22 Nov 2009
83
95th
taking the sex-cars metaphor to the next level.
Rated 26 Nov 2009
61
14th
Not Cronenberg's best. But really interesting.
Rated 15 Jan 2010
50
33rd
Hmmmm...It's certainly unusual. But is it "good"? Not sure yet. Anyway, it is original, as evidenced by the line, ""Can you imagine what his anus looks like? Describe it to me." I thought I'd only ever hear that in a Mel Gibson film.
Rated 15 Jan 2010
61
22nd
783
Rated 22 Jan 2010
69
53rd
This one doesn't quite work for me. I understand that it's about sex, death, and a bizarre kind of cultish posthumanism a la Videodrome's "new flesh," but most of this just feels too silly. It's not supposed to be about mere car crash fetishism, but when all these characters do is drive around like maniacs or morosely fuck & kiss each other (and their scars) in auto wreckage it just feels like the theme is repetitive, stretched out awkwardly... If only it actually felt erotic instead of gross.
Rated 31 Jan 2010
60
15th
the premise is actually somewhat interesting if youre a weird enough person. but its still poorly executed. not awful though
Rated 08 Mar 2010
85
78th
I respect both Ballard and Cronenberg as well as Spader and Hunter but this just didn't work on the silver screen.
Rated 16 May 2010
81
91st
Awkward sex quota: off the charts.
Rated 22 Jul 2010
95
97th
Cronenberg's sexy and disturbing film erases the line between soft human flesh and compact metal, discovered through the emotionally-devoid, but sexually-frightening lives of it's upper-class characters. I don't know about you, but this film drove straight up my alley.
Rated 26 Aug 2010
80
43rd
Good movie, but depressing. And overhyped. It's a one-time see.
Rated 26 Oct 2010
32
19th
alt alt for belærende og så hader jeg, at filmens forløsning, da det ser allerværst ud skal komme fra gud/skæbnen!
Rated 03 Nov 2010
77
68th
i had the option to watch the nc-17 version or the r version... guess which one i picked. teehee.
Rated 19 Dec 2010
79
63rd
Very creepy, and surprisingly engaging.
Rated 20 Jul 2011
84
67th
CRASH deals, as Ebert put it, with a fictional fetish; car crashes as turn-ons. But David Cronenberg presents a world where this seems wholly legitimate. Not for the sensitive, CRASH is a mightily perverse work, bolstered by fine performances, especially Elias Koteas' Vaughan, both disturbing and magnetic. Excellent makeup as well. Only complaints: Holly Hunter's performance seems a bit off, and some of the plot threads (including hers) aren't too well resolved. Otherwise, a fascinating work.
Rated 21 Aug 2011
80
81st
It's offensive and disgusting, but also so beautiful.
Rated 16 Sep 2011
40
9th
Preachy oscar-bait garbage.
Rated 02 Dec 2011
61
22nd
#775
Rated 30 Dec 2011
66
15th
A lot of people love this but I found it dull and had a TV movie quality about it.
Rated 11 Feb 2012
87
86th
This is why I love older Cronenberg movies. They are always very unique, interesting, shocking and meaningful. He's not afraid to show things visually, where other directors might just imply or allude to it. The atmosphere he creates in this movie is great. The concept is a bit unrealistic, but most of his movies are. I love how it shows how sexually motivated people can get. Fetishism at an extreme. After watching something like this, it's easier to sympathize with a rapist or pedophile.
Rated 03 Apr 2012
60
28th
59.750
Rated 18 Apr 2012
97
92nd
Great Movie!
Rated 25 May 2012
40
31st
Crash is interesting only because of its subject matter. After you get past that, there's little to keep you engaged and I ended up becoming bored thanks to the lack of a real story and the poorly developed characters. There needs to be something to keep the audience watching your film, and Crash didn't have anything. It might be a controversial film thanks to the sex scenes, and the car crashes feel more real than many other films, but Crash isn't worth your time.
Rated 19 Jul 2012
55
21st
Sure, the main idea is quite interesting but the way Cronenberg handles it is disappointing. There are intriguing scenes/interactions, but ultimately the plot -accepting that there actually is one- leads nowhere and the central concept is mostly left unexploited. Not to mention some scenes are just unbelievably silly -although, sadly, I don't think Cronenberg intended it to be that way.
Rated 07 Aug 2012
85
76th
Sex with women, men, wounds, cars, and machines.
Rated 20 Oct 2012
85
59th
I'm pretty sure it's the only film where you can see Elias Koteas lick James Spader's leg, so it has that going for it.
Rated 19 Jan 2013
32
11th
Obvious Oscar bait is obvious.
Rated 20 Jan 2013
86
94th
* Casting, Acting : 8 * Script : 7.5 * Directing, Aura : 9.5 * Ease of Viewing : 8.5 * Naked Eye : 9.5
Rated 21 Jan 2013
40
11th
Crude, unnessary film with a couple who get their rocks off by car crashes! Not for most people, and while it was quite interesting it's nothing I would ever see a second time.
Rated 18 Mar 2013
79
64th
Interesting and morbid film. Cronenberg's detached, voyeuristic style is put to good use here, with plenty of sex but none of it in any way arousing. Instead he explores the blurring of the lines between life and death with some gruesome imagery - and the more gruesome imaginations of our characters. I was going to say the characters don't develop enough but the last act of the film really clicks and makes you understand what you were watching in the first place. Almost a romantic drama, too!
Rated 26 Mar 2013
93
79th
Review can be found here: http://madman731.wordpress.com/2013/03/26/auto-erotic-accidents-and-almost-death-a-look-at-crash/
Rated 03 Jun 2013
72
57th
A very flaccid and stoic film, which also happens to be narratively intense and formally focused. I suppose the whole enterprise takes 'fetishizing as abstraction' to its logical conclusion: sexual fetishizing abstracted into a purgatory of perpetual ennui. (With a color scheme dominated by Reds, Whites, and Blues, mind.) Even Spader's acting sucks. If this NC-17 film will get any rise out of you, it will be discomfort - but since it aims for that mark, it succeeds.
Rated 07 Oct 2013
62
25th
61.500
Rated 11 Nov 2013
92
96th
JAMES: What about the reshaping of the human body by modern technology? I thought that was your project. VAUGHAN: A crude sci-fi concept that floats on the surface and doesn't threaten anybody. I use it to test the resilience of my potential partners in psychopathology.
Rated 17 Nov 2013
78
64th
Owns the peculiar over-arching theme of an emotionless combination of bent metal, contortionist sex & death. Blurring the sudden trauma a collision puts a body through and what we do to each other during making fuck. Crash carries along merging the two in a series of simulated collision-porn, actual automobile impacts and lots of uncomfortable car sex (gender regardless). Bringing new meaning to auto-eroticism, Crash is another solid niche effort from Cronenberg.
Rated 12 Jul 2014
33
42nd
None of the haunted obsession of jgb's work generally, and doesn't wield the acute precision of his prose, but also hardly very interesting taken on its own terms-- still, some of the hate this has gotten historically is pretty silly. [shrugs] idk. Just don't care for it.
Rated 12 Aug 2014
80
50th
I praise the film's daring exploration of one of the deepest, darkest, least communicated subjects (fetishes), and the last line and the following closing shot are both emotionally haunting.
Rated 20 Aug 2014
90
21st
insightfull subject

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