"The Crash" Review

In 2022, on a pre-dawn morning in a suburb of Cleveland, OH, a Toyota Corolla traveling nearly 100 mph sailed through a T-intersection and into a building, tearing the car in half. Inside the wreckage, first responders found two dead young men - 20-year-old Dominic Russo and 19-year-old Davion Flanagan - as well as the driver, 17-year-old Mackenzie Shirilla, who was critically injured and was the girlfriend of Dominic. But the shock the residents of the town at this senseless loss of life was doubled when Shirilla was charged with murder of the boys on the basis of her never letting off the gas or touching the brakes before impact.

This is the story of The Crash, the new Netflix documentary recounting the investigation and her trial and conviction for murder. (Spoiler alert!) Interviewing her friends, her parents and those of the dead boys, and Assistant Prosecuting Attorney Tim Troup from the Cuyahoga County Prosecutor’s Office who assembled the case, along with copious video from her social media where she lived her best party girl life, we're given a portrait of a spoiled narcissistic brat who was enabled by parents who even now don't seem to feel their little princess did anything wrong. They didn't see a problem with her smoking Snoop Dogg amounts of weed or shacking up with Dom at only 17. At the sentencing, the judge admonished her mother for being so blithe about the deaths.

 Apparently this case has been covered in a couple of other shows and I've seen some comments that details were left out here like she may've checked out the route she took indicating premeditation, not a spur of the moment impulsive decision. When she appears to make her claim that she didn't do it - she claims she blacked out from a medical condition - it's just as contrived and remorseless as how she acted after the accident. (And according to stories that are running after this doc's release, she's just as bad in slam as she comes off here.) 

 Perhaps the filmmaker's intent was to just let Mackenzie and her folks speak for themselves, but it feels like some more details could've been included like amplifying what exactly was Dom's sources of income beyond some vape selling and a desire to make a fashion line. The terminally online nature of youth is also appalling to this old Gen Xer. No wonder life is meaningless and worthless to the soulless brats of today. 

Score: 6/10. Catch it on Netflix.