"Crossing Over"

By David Hudson on 02/27/2009

"'Crossing Over' is an LA-based ensemble social-problem melodrama for people who thought 'Crash' was a bit too subtle," writes David Edelstein in New York.

"'Crossing Over' couldn't be better intentioned or more timely," writes Dana Stevens in Slate. "But it also couldn't be preachier or more reductive of the issues it proposes to explore: assimilation, transnationalism, post-9/11 governmental paranoia. In the end, the movie's let's-examine-this-from-all-sides approach is simply muddled: After making the case that America's treatment of its immigrants is only one step removed from Abu Ghraib, [director Wayne] Kramer asks us to get all choked up about the 'sublime promise' of US citizenship."

"If Mr Kramer's outrage felt honest, his film would be easier to respect," writes Manohla Dargis in the New York Times.

"[G]iven the law of averages, it was only a matter of time before a film came along that managed to out-stupid 'Crash,' and, now we have it," writes Jeff Reichert in Reverse Shot.

"Kramer - who doesn't really seem to like people very much - [fails] to muster even the superficial empathy the makers of the similarly programmatic 'The Visitor' and 'Rendition' showed toward their own cardboard-cutout imperiled illegals," writes Scott Foundas.

"[T]he film's straight-faced presentation of its pap is pure hilarity, especially with regard to Ray Liotta's green card official, who blackmails a beautiful, blond, Australian illegal (Alice Eve) into two months of sexual slavery, then comes home to a wife (Ashley Judd) eager to adopt a Nigerian child whose mother has AIDS, a storyline so outrageous and laughably self-serious it shuttles the entire film into the realm of parody," writes Nick Schager in Slant.

It is indeed "laughable when it isn't flat-out unwatchable," agrees Alonso Duralde at MSNBC.

"'Crossing Over' is an interesting failure, a movie that at least strives to be about something," writes Salon's Stephanie Zacharek, "entangling itself with the question of what it means to be an American - or, more specifically, what it means to deserve to live here."

"Not a single film nominated for this year's best picture Oscar had the excitement of Wayne Kramer's 2006 'Running Scared.'" And he's off... Armond White in the New York Press.

Online listening tip #1. Matt Singer and Alison Willmore discuss "hyperlink cinema."

Online listening tip #2. Aaron Hillis talks with Kramer at GreenCine Daily.

[Photo: "Crossing Over," The Weinstein Company, 2009]

Tags: Crossing Over, Wayne Kramer