Crash is one of the best films I've seen that actually deals with race relations today. Yeah, its a little dramatic and even impossible, but I would argue that at least a movie is trying to face race relations on screen.
Nevertheless, the problem lies in its portrayal (or lack of portrayal) of Asians. Actually, let me take that back. Its portrayal of ASIANS is fine to an extent; its LACK of portrayal of Asian AMERICANS is what is terrible.
The film has characters and stereotypes and counter stereotypes of nearly all the major races in America - the thugish black stereotype, the racist white cop, the rich white woman, the light skinned "uncle tom" character, etc etc. For once, a film puts racial tensions on screen with lost of complexities, which is fantastic. But, its portrayal of Asians is one sided - Asians are foreign and can't speak English.
If you can show the good, the bad, and the ugly of whites, blacks, and latinos, why not for asians? Where are the American born Asian Americans like me? Where is the story of the Korean kid who works at his immigrant fathers shop in koreatown? What about 4th generation Japanese who still get labeled as immigrants?
See the film again, and you'll get what i mean. Asians continue to be foreign, poor English speaking people in most films today.
.
