Prejudice And Racism In The Movie 'Crash'

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Zechariah Brown CGI English 11 HH Mrs. Rembert 11/12/14 Déjà vu? An American singer and songwriter David Allen Coe once said “All men are created equal, it is only men themselves who place themselves above equality.”, and in the approximate 408 years between the conception of The Merchant of Venice by William Shakespeare and the movie Crash by co-written, produced, and directed by Paul Haggis classism is evident throughout both. In the Merchant of Venice the reader follows Antonio, a white Christian merchant whose love for his friend Bassanio prompts him to make a deal with the Jewish merchant Shylock. Bassanio is in pursuit of the fair Portia whose father passed away, leaving a riddle for his daughter’s prospective suitors, essentially controlling her fate from beyond the grave. The movie Crash follows the lives of a group of people for two days, as their stories begin to overlap and intertwine. The theme of classism in the form of racism and sexism is evident in Crash, the modern retelling of The Merchant of Venice. One of the forms taken by classism is racism. Racism is defined as the prejudice or discrimination of a group of people based solely on their race. Characteristics of members of a particular race are exacerbated and in many cases falsified to rationalize the treatment of this group. In…show more content…
As a Middle Eastern immigrant in a post-Gulf War America, he suffers injustices that cause him to distrust other races. This distrust, which strongly boarders on paranoia, peaks in lack of communication/understanding in which a handyman (played by Michael Peña), cannot fix his door. Fahrad tracks down the handyman and holds him at gunpoint nearly killing the handyman’s daughter. In both stories involve an unpopular minority who as a result of the disregard for their humanity, become a

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