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Run Lola Run (1998) is a film about the choices and decisions people make in life, and how those choices impact people and those around them. It draws on components of the chaos theory, equifinality, cause and effect, and good old-fashioned coincidence to craft three similar but definitively unique retellings of the same story. We see the way minor differences in Lola’s (Franka Potente) timeline can result in big changes, not just for Lola, but for everyone with whom she interacts - directly or indirectly.

Crash (2004) is a film about racial and social tensions in modern Los Angeles. It is a completely different film from Run Lola Run in terms of plot, origin, intention, and cinematic construction, but a chief similarity is shared between the two pictures: both amplify the impact our decisions and actions can have on the lives of others, usually without our awareness. Both films contain pocketed story arcs that manipulate one another to tell the overall tale.

Every character in Crash’s ensemble narrative is woven together, largely in ways that go unknown by the characters. Many of its tangled plotlines eventually come to a cumulative head - or a crash - wherein the characters understand many of the consequences their earlier behaviors had on others. This retrospective comprehension plays into the theme established by Run Lola Run’s opening quote by T.S. Eliot about understanding one’s position in life only after being afforded the opportunity to experience it and reflect.

This culmination of character storylines is never quite as momentous for Run Lola Run’s titular character. Its third sequence reunites Lola with the bank security guard in the ambulance, but otherwise she remains generally unaware of the consequences of most of her interactions. But Run Lola Run’s final “run” incorporates everything from the film’s history, from Lola’s stolen moped causing the crash that injures her father and friend, to revealing the purpose for the ambulance’s presence on the street, in a Crash-like manner.

The methods of the two films vary. Run Lola Run is very much an experimental piece working with various thematic concepts and cinematic approaches. Crash is a straightforward major film release with mainstream appeal that won it the Academy Award for Best Picture. But both pictures remind viewers that our lives are all part of a larger whole. Nobody is immune to the influence of others, no matter how benign a relationship or interaction between two people may be, its impact can be far more significant than it seems.