This movie is not new but I somehow managed to never see it for 20 years. While a lot of people celebrate Steven Soderbergh as a great director, I never really paid much attention to him or his name. I think a lot of this has to do with the fact that I had never seen Traffic.
This film speaks to me and many others on a number of levels as the movie has everything to do with the drug trade and tackles the "problem" from multiple angles. Although it is a work of fiction, there are so many truths that are kind of exposed in this epic film.
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First of all, what a star-studded cast this thing has: Don Cheadle, Benicio Del Toro, Michael Douglas, Dennis Quaid, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Topher Grace, and James Brolin all make appearances in this movie. The film focuses mostly on 4 stories though and each of these intertwine although the 4 people never actually meet one another.
The movie takes on the very well-trodden topic of the illegal drug trade that goes on in the United States but manages to approach the topic is a very different fashion by highlighting the more complex nature of the "war on drugs," and how in many ways, the entire operation and expenditure on the part of the U.S. government is in many ways a complete waste of time.
All 4 of the major stories that intertwine are compelling but the one I enjoyed the most was Benicio Del Toro's depiction of Javier Rodriguez, a Mexican police detective whose next move we are always guessing.
We are lead to believe at multiple times that Rodriguez is a cop on the take and is corrupt and then a few minutes later we are wondering if it is all a show so that he can infiltrate the drug underworld. Honestly, by the end of the film we are still not completely sure which side he is on and I think that is probably part of the reason why he won an Academy Award for his performance.
Throughout the film we are presented to the cross-border drug trade from a multitude of perspectives including the drug lords themselves, the lower-level enforcement in the states with the DEA, the high-level federal administrative wing of things, and also the end user rich kids who indulge and experience very little in the way of difficulty obtaining these very illegal substances.
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I don't consider Topher Grace to be a great actor (neither does Hollywood, apparently) but his performance as rich kid enabler, "Seth Abrahams" has to be his best role that he has ever done. To be fair to Topher, I would be willing to bet that it is very difficult to convince filmmakers that you aren't just going to "70's show" every performance. Anyway, he totally nails this role and has some words of wisdom towards the end about how the drug game is never going away because it is too profitable. This message of his resonates with me exactly.
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Outside of the Ironman films, Don Cheadle is always a welcome addition to a film and in my personal opinion he is one of the best actors alive today. His portrayal of DEA agent Montel Gordon, is nothing short of exceptional but it apparently wasn't good enough to attract the attention of any of the major awards out there in lala land. Through his story we get to see the high level of dedication that he puts into his job, only to realize from the mouth of a captured criminal, exactly how pointless his operation and the busts that they make really are.
When I watched this film I thought that it must have the same team behind it as a 2004 movie that is presented in a similar fashion called Crash but as it turns out they have absolutely nothing to do with one another. On a side note Crash is also an amazing film that you should definitely see.
Should I watch it?
Without question yes. Between the amazing lineup of stars, the pace that never gets boring, and the way the story comes together in a non-predictable fashion (predictability is such a plague in Hollywood) and the fact that his movie, although a work of fiction, is incredibly relevant as far as the drug trade is concerned, are 3 very powerful reasons to see this film if you have not already done so.
It is easily one of the best films I have watched in the past month.
