When Worlds Collide

Paula McClain's political science class has spent the semester talking about race. On Monday, the 15 students added another person to that conversation: Paul Haggis, the Academy-Award-winning writer and director of the film "Crash."

In a conference call from Los Angeles, Haggis told the students he wanted his movie to make people uncomfortable by forcing them to confront their deep-seated attitudes about race.

Referring to himself sardonically as "Mr. Big Liberal Lefty," he said having his Porsche carjacked 10 years ago made him aware of how we tell ourselves lies about our own racial attitudes. That experience provided the spark for the movie.

"We act well, and go around saying the right thing," he said. "We tell ourselves that we're not afraid of those three Hispanic kids walking down the street dressed like gangbangers -- because we believe we shouldn't be."

The film takes place in Los Angeles over two days, and interweaves different characters, including a black police detective, two car thieves, the district attorney and his wife, a racist veteran cop and his idealistic younger partner, a successful black Hollywood director and a Hispanic locksmith and his daughter.

Recently, one group of students used clips from "Crash" in a class presentation on changes and trends in black and white attitudes, and senior Chris Dekom offered to contact Haggis, a family friend. The film's themes dovetailed with the ones the students have been discussing in the class, called "Race and American Politics."

"It's not just simple black and white," Dekom said, adding that nobody is completely a racist or completely free of prejudice.

Chelsea Friauf-Evans, a student in the class, said she was interested in how racial attitudes affect public policy.

"What he's talking about is how American perceive race and racism," she said.

Haggis said that in most movies, race and racism is portrayed simplistically and the typical storyline involves well-meaning white people who go to help oppressed black people fight against bad white people. But Haggis said he wanted to capture the ambiguity and complexity of Americans' racial -- and racist -- attitudes.

In the movie, a brutal police officer risks his life to save an African-American motorist from a car crash, while his partner, who is disgusted by the other police officer's attitude, ends up shooting and killing an African-American man. The idea, Haggis said, is to twist all our conventional attitudes around and force the viewer to confront themselves. Although he declined to speak directly about the lacrosse situation, it raises the same race and class conflicts that he explored in his movie.

"I think that we all believe that we are good," he said. "You point your finger and say, 'Those are the bad people over there.' I think you're experiencing something like that down there right now. You're in a difficult situation down there, but you're addressing it, and that's the most important thing."

McClain said she has worked hard to make students in the class feel comfortable with each other so they can discuss the uncomfortable issues of race. That way, students of different races and backgrounds can disagree with each others' ideas without taking the discussion personally, she said. Although the class began long before the lacrosse situation arose, and they've talked about it a lot.

"We are all in a lot of pain," McClain said. "Issues of race and class have to be dealt with directly. We can't dance around it."