Crash (1996) - DaaVeeDee

Crash (1996) (DVD) (*)

$20.99

Screened, competed or awarded at:
Cannes Film Festival
Other Film Festival Awards

Language Selections:
English ( Dolby Digital 2.0 )
English ( Dolby Digital 5.1 )
French ( Dolby Digital 2.0 )
French ( Subtitles )

Product Origin/Format:
France ( PAL/Region 2 )

Running Time:
96 min

Aspect Ratio:
Widescreen (1.78:1)

Special Features:
Cast/Crew Interview(s)
Interactive Menu
Scene Access
Trailer(s)
Remastered

Movie filmed in 1996 and produced in:
Canada ( USA, Canada )
United States ( USA, Canada )

Directed By:
David Cronenberg

Written By:
J.G. Ballard
David Cronenberg

Actors:
James Spader ..... James Ballard
Holly Hunter ..... Helen Remington
Elias Koteas ..... Vaughan
Deborah Kara Unger ..... Catherine Ballard (as Deborah Unger)
Rosanna Arquette ..... Gabrielle
Peter MacNeill ..... Colin Seagrave
Yolande Julian ..... Airport Hooker
Cheryl Swarts ..... Vera Seagrave
Judah Katz ..... Salesman
Nicky Guadagni ..... Tattooist
Ronn Sarosiak ..... A.D.
Boyd Banks ..... Grip
Markus Parilo ..... Man in Hanger
Alice Poon ..... Camera Girl
John Stoneham Jr. ..... Trask

Synopsis:

After surviving a brutal car wreck, commercial director James Ballard finds himself slowly drawn to a mysterious subculture of people who have transformed automobile accidents into erotic events. Like the J.G. Ballard novel that inspired it, David Cronenberg's study of the sexual dimension of man's relationship to technology was a magnet for controversy, drawing a NC-17 rating and criticism from several sources, including studio owner Ted Turner, who attempted to prevent the film's American release. But though some have leveled charges of pornography, James' descent into this fetishistic underworld is approached with cold, scientific detachment. Characters like Vaughn, the charismatic group leader who stages recreations of celebrity car crashes, seem more like driven researchers than sexual renegades, which is undoubtedly part of the film's point. This impression is reinforced by the pristine cinematography by Peter Suschitzsky, which proves particularly haunting during a crucial accident scene, and Howard Shore's superb score. Far from exploitative, Crash in fact proves less transgressive than the original novel, but is still undoubtedly not for all tastes.

James and Catherine Ballard are a married couple whose sex life has been reduced to recounting tales of mutual infidelity to turn each other on. One night, James causes a head-on collision with a car carrying Dr. Helen Remington, killing her husband and severely injuring her and himself. Subsequent encounters with each other find that she is oddly sexually aroused by the danger of car accidents and potential accidents, and, he soon falls in with a cult of car-crash fetishists and invites his wife to join in with them. The group is led by Vaughan, a former scientist twisted by his own disfigurement in an accident and, as a result, a man obsessed with car crashes as a liberation of sexual energy. Vaughan inducts the Ballards and Dr. Remington into his surreal world of sex in the back seats of cars, re-enactments of famous car crashes such as James Dean and Jayne Mansfield, viewing photos of accident victims, screenings of collision videos as a kind of pornography, and fender benders as mating rituals.

Since a road accident left him with serious facial and bodily scarring, a former TV scientist has become obsessed by the marriage of motor-car technology with what he sees as the raw sexuality of car-crash victims. The scientist, along with a crash victim he has recently befriended, sets about performing a series of sexual acts in a variety of motor vehicles, either with other crash victims or with prostitutes whom they contort into the shape of trapped corpses. Ultimately, the scientist craves a suicidal union of blood, semen, and engine coolant, a union with which he becomes dangerously obsessed.

This product was added to our catalog on Thursday 11 February, 2021.