Though Crash has been nominated for six Academy Awards, including Best Motion Picture, it is difficult to say how the film advances racial tolerance given its vilifying portrayal of Asians. Hailed as an honest and provocative depiction of post-9/11 racism in America, Paul Haggis's directorial debut dares to blatantly display common racial stereotypes, in order to deconstruct them through the reality of race. The film deals with society's perceptions of blacks, whites, Middle Easterners, Latinos, and Asians by depicting racial interactions that boil over, exposing the latent ethnic discrimination within the supposed melting pot of Los Angeles. Yet the film attempts to bridge these ethnic divides through unsettling sequences that dispel preconceived notions about race, advance universal tolerance, and promote understanding of people whose lives are ruled circumstance.

Crash brazenly shows skewed prejudices against minorities. Latinos become cheating Mexican gang bangers. Middle Easterners become stubborn and incoherent convenience store owners. Blacks become gun-toting criminals. Asians become greedy smugglers. And whites oversee this chaos with condescending bigotry. The film boldly takes the perspective of intolerant and quick to anger white Los Angelinos, a perspective filled with racial slurs, injustices, and narrow-mindedness, leaving viewers in disbelief.

However as the film progresses, Crash manages a portrayal of Latinos, Middle Easterners, and blacks that goes beyond these unfair stereotypes. The characters become more than their initial stereotypes imply; they become human. The Latino characters become loving fathers and mothers. The Middle Eastern characters, though stubborn, comprehend and appreciate their mistakes. And the black characters, despite their criminal history, see the worth of human life beyond race.

Crash shows that people are people. Most importantly Crash shows that race and stereotypes are meaningless, yet at the same time significantly influential in how society views its individual members. The film intertwines stories in which racist characters gain the compassion to come to the aid of those that they once thought unworthy. For example, LA police officer Ryan (Matt Dillon) regularly profiles blacks while on the job. In one particular sequence, Ryan shamelessly molests a black woman in front of her husband, yet later selflessly rescues that same humiliated woman from a burning car. Similar redemption is given to Ludacris's character, Anthony, who first steals a car, runs over a man with it, then tries to sell off that man's van, but still manages to regain some dignity through his actions at the conclusion of the film.

In contrast, Asians receive only a negative representation in the film. The movie's opening scene depicts an Asian woman involved in a car accident. Both parties are angry, with the Asian woman speaking shrilly in broken English, while the Latina detective mocks her. Later, an overly boisterous Asian woman bursts into a hospital shouting her husband's name. The white nurse shakes her disapproving head at the obnoxious Asian intrusion. Once the woman finds her husband, the couple's only concern is centered on quickly turning a buck. The image of Asians that Crash creates is that Asians are pushy, avaricious, bad drivers, and heartless.

So when does Crash turn the stereotype on its head and say, "Hey, Asians are not all insufferable and materialistic?" When does the film redeem Asians from their stereotype, like other characters find atonement through heroism or altruism?

While blacks, whites, Middle Easterners, and Latinos prove that they are more than their skin color imply, the little Asians of the film are left unredeemed. Crash only opens the door of Asian stereotypes and leaves the Asian characters without any closure. And because Hollywood has not said otherwise, the American impression of Asians remains that Asians are pushy, loud, materialistic, and that all are terrible, terrible drivers.

The other characters portrayed are given the opportunity to transcend their typecasts and become part of the fabric of a diverse Los Angeles society. According to the film's representation, Asians appear to all be elderly women caked with makeup to hide their age or elderly men who only know a few common English phrases. Their heavy Asian accents are dominant in their English speech. Their names -- "Choi," "Park," "Kim Lee" -- are too foreign for American tongues. Crash's Asians seem to have recently crawled out of some cargo-hold, and are too Asian to be American, and therefore not part of American culture and society -- thus not worth placing in good light.

For a movie that wants to "boldly remind us of the importance of tolerance as it ventures across color lines...and uncover the truth of our shared humanity," as the Lion's Gate synopsis states, Asians seem incongruously left out. No Asians, not even Daniel Dae Kim of Lost fame, appear on the cast list on the Crash website.

At first Crash seems to be a film meant to overcome racism in America. But a deeper look at the film suggests that none of the characters truly find a deeper understanding of humanity; instead, their "positive" deeds are selfish acts meant to redeem the individual character and not their racial group, and are nothing more than reactions to a race conscious world. Poignant as Officer Ryan's heroism may be, he is simply performing his duty as a police officer, and the trapped woman's race, sex, or class is irrelevant. However, Crash implies that Officer Ryan made a special effort to save the black woman, whom he had disgustingly mistreated earlier. If anything, the chauvinistic cop attempted to save her out of his own guilt.

As an anthology of racial crimes and redemptions, Crash portrays African Americans, Middle Easterners, Latinos, and whites as having the ability to learn from mistaken racial assumptions to build a greater tolerance for those unlike themselves. By no means should Crash be passed up due to some of its misguided content. The way numerous storylines intertwine and merge together adds a depth to the film that is rarely achieved. The actors perform the conflicted outer anger and inner helplessness with seamless balance. The film's attempts at bringing race out into the open is a bold beginning, but also reminds audiences to be actively critical of what the film asks us to believe.