Traffic

I first saw Traffic in January 2001, on the eve of our first Atlantic City trip. I remember being quite struck by the rawness of its depiction, and thankfully, six years later, it hasn't lost its edge one bit.

Directed by Steven Soderbergh, who's largely remembered for sex, lies, and videotape and the Ocean's Eleven series, Traffic is an ensemble piece, with multiple storylines being told in parallel fashion, sometimes intertwining, sometimes affecting the other. No one story or actor is giving top billing, so to speak—despite the amount of starpower in this film—and I very much admired this approach. Essentially, the story of Traffic revolves around three plot lines, and the film opens quietly onto the first: a lonely desert in Mexico where two cops, Javier Rodriguez (Benicio Del Toro) and his partner Manolo (Jacob Vargas), bust a moving van for hauling drugs—only to have their bust taken off their hands by the powerful General Salazar (Tomas Milian). We then move onto Cincinnati, Ohio, where Judge Robert Wakefield (Michael Douglas) has just been appointed the head of the president's anti-drug initiative. And in San Diego, California, undercover DEA agents Montel Gordon (Don Cheadle) and Ray Castro (Luis Guzman) are trying to infiltrate the operations of Eduardo Ruiz (Miguel Ferrer), only their cover almost gets blown when the local PD makes a bust of their own on Ruiz's base.

That's a pretty good start in my book! And thankfully that good start paved the way for an even greater continuation. Down in Tijuana, a few days after being robbed of their drug bust, Javier is approached by General Salazar again, with what is essentially a job offer for him and Manolo (though mostly for Javier). Since he has nothing else to do, Javier accepts, and his first task is to bring in the assassin Francisco Flores (Clifton Collins, Jr.) from one of the rival drug cartels for "interrogation." For a while, Javier and Manolo enjoy their new life under the tutelage of General Salazar . . . but very slowly, and after some really terrible events, Javier starts to wonder if the General isn't really the great man he once thought—and against his better judgment, Javier begins to supply the DEA with information.

On the DEA side of life, Monty and Ray successfully make their bust on Eduardo Ruiz, and after much badgering, they persuade him to testify against his drug-smuggler boss, Carlos Ayala (Steven Bauer)—leaving his wife Helena (Catherine Zeta-Jones) broke because the government has frozen all of their assets. But Helena, you see, doesn't realize that her husband is a drug smuggler; throughout their marriage, she'd been under the impression that he was nothing more than a successful businessman, and not involved in anything as illegal as drugs. Ultimately, it was their lawyer, Arnie Metzgar (Dennis Quaid), who broke the truth to Helena . . . and now Helena must face a difficult dilemma about how to set her husband free. Does she sit back and let their lawyers clear Carlos's name—or does she take matters into her own hands by taking over Carlos's business and targeting Eduardo Ruiz before he can testify?

And in the larger political context, Robert Wakefield slowly begins to wade into the Washington world of anti-drug policy. After being briefed by the president's chief of staff (Albert Finney, probably on loan from Erin Brockovich), Robert gets a rather chilling—and dare I say, defeatist—assessment from the former drug czar (James Brolin) about just how volatile and sensitive Robert's position really is because of all that's at stake in fighting the drug war. But that doesn't deter Robert from approaching his new job with passion and determination. There's even a great scene of him hobnobbing at a Georgetown home with various real-life politicians. But unbeknownst to Robert, there's a little problem at home, for his teenage daughter Caroline (Erika Christensen) has started freebasing with her boyfriend Seth (Topher Grace). And after they get busted outside the emergency room when one of their friends overdoses, Robert is given a serious reality check about the drug world—one he's unprepared to contend with, since it reveals to him that he's really powerless to fight the war on drugs.

So yeah, there are some political overtones to Traffic. (How can there not be?) When Robert was on the plane trying to brainstorm with his team, I found it very telling that he "opened the dam" to new ideas . . . and not a single person spoke. What does that say about our political system's ability to combat this threat? Or when he travels to Mexico City and listens to General Salazar's ideas on "treatment of addiction"? I think the most telling feature, though, was when Robert travelled to EPIC and listened to the briefing about foreign drug cartels and how they're light years ahead of us—completely circumventing the system and turning drugs into a billionaire's enterprise. The final blow to Robert's mission comes when he arrives home after a fight with his wife to find Caroline getting high. After their painfully heated altercation, no longer can he live in denial about the terrible realities he's faced with—at home and abroad—in fighting the drug war.

I honestly can't say one bad thing about the acting in Traffic. Don Cheadle and Luis Guzman had amazing chemistry together, and their scenes were the most fun to watch (and let's be honest, any movie with Luis Guzman is a good movie in my book!). Erika Christensen turned in a stellar performance as the disillusioned, addicted daughter on her way to rock bottom. And Benicio Del Toro? When I first saw this in 2001, I only knew him as Fenster from The Usual Suspects, so his dramatic turn in Traffic really impressed me. He even won an Oscar for this role!

Traffic isn't a feel-good movie by a long shot. While not as downtrodden as Syriana, Traffic does offer us some hope at the end. I wish I knew why, but that final scene of Javier sitting at the nighttime baseball game under the lights . . . I find it to be very uplifting! Or when Monty plants a new bug inside Carlos and Helena's home (in what's really a funny scene, despite the fighting that breaks out). And when Caroline stands before her AA group at the end and gives her "good day" speech, she largely sums up the most important theme (maybe even lesson) of Traffic: that our current war against drugs in unwinnable, but there is hope for the individual. I know it may not seem like much, but it's definitely enough for her, Robert, Monty, and Javier.

Traffic made it to the Oscars that year, winning 4 out of its 5 nominations: for director Steven Soderbergh, supporting actor Benicio Del Toro, film editing, and adapted screenplay. It's one loss was Best Picture, to Gladiator, though I still think Traffic should have been the winner that year (sorry, Dad). I'm kind of surprised that Traffic didn't earn a musical score nomination, though—or a cinematography nomination, because I absolutely loved the color scheme that Soderbergh applied to each locale within the film: an intense yellow haze to Mexico, a blue filter to Robert's scenes in Washington and Cincinnati (that ultimately cleared up by the end), and a sort of off-white filter for the California sequences that made everything seem too bright. I found that very inventive.

But I must give mention to the brilliance of screenwriter Stephen Gaghan for adapting Traffic from its original medium. Traffic was based on a 6-part British mini-series entitled Traffik, which essentially told the same story but in a more epic scope, as well as in a different setting. Traffik the mini-series was set entirely throughout Europe: the lawmaker/daughter story (think of Robert and Caroline) took place in London; the wife-turned-drug-trafficker/lawyer/police duo story (Helena/Arnie, Monty/Ray/Eduardo) took place in Hamburg, Germany; and the Tijuana story actually took place in Pakistan, where a local poppy farmer comes under the tutelage of the local drug kingpin. The original mini-series was amazingly gripping, and screenwriter Gaghan had quite a task ahead of him in adapting this to the big screen. Suffice it to say, he succeeded in spades! The pacing of the Soderbergh Traffic doesn't at all feel rushed or condensed, and so much of the original story is retained (though I found the pampered wife taking over her husband's drug business a bit more believable in the mini-series).

I recommend seeing both the mini-series and the movie, as both are good viewing. But for the purposes of this review, I give the Soderbergh Traffic a 10 out of 10.