You picked David Cronenberg’s Crash as a movie you’re jealous you didn’t make. 

Oh, I jerk off to that movie. [laughs]

– Interview with John Waters, Rolling Stone, 2014

John Waters may not have made Crash (1996), but its influence permeates his injury-fuelled sex comedy A Dirty Shame (2004). In both films, a road injury is the inciting incident for our protagonist’s journey into a subculture of bizarre fetishes. The films differ greatly in tone and style—Waters is vulgar, Cronenberg is subtle—but the two provocative perversions share notable similarities.

In Crash, the leader of this underground sex community is Vaughan (Elias Koteas), a soft-spoken weirdo who sometimes role plays as a mechanic. A Criterion essay writes of Koteas playing Vaughan with “messianic zeal”. His analogue is found in A Dirty Shame’s mechanic Ray-Ray (Johnny Knoxville), who is a literal sexual messiah.

Through their encounters with these men, both protagonists—Crash’s James (James Spader) and A Dirty Shame’s Sylvia (Tracey Ullman)—discover whole new worlds of sexual exploration, which are frequently commingled with violence. A concussion is a terrible thing to waste.

A Dirty Shame screens at Lido Cinemas in Melbourne and Ritz Cinemas in Sydney on April 11. 

**********

Ivana Brehas is a writer, teacher, and actor based in Naarm. Her work has appeared in Dazed, Bright Wall/Dark Room, The Big Issue, Sight & Sound, Senses of Cinema, 4:3, Rough Cut, and more.