Crushed

Race cars are roaring under a clear blue sky, while a female voice delivers a lucid recollection of a soul crushing love affair. As the camera captures instances of this violent spectacle of vividly coloured metal carcasses clashing and crashing, the director recounts the minutiae of an abusive relationship. Slowly, as the film’s carefully cadenced editing unfolds, the initially surprising associations of images and memories give way to realisation, the battered bodies of the cars becoming a metaphorical embodiment of her own body. More than a therapeutic gesture, the film offers a nuanced anthropological inquiry into the inner workings of romantic imagination, while subtly inviting the viewers to question their own biases. To touch upon the homonymous inspiration for the film’s concept — is a crush called a crush because it crushes you? (Oana Ghera)