Probably the largest-scale film about drug trafficking since THE POPPY IS ALSO
A FLOWER (1966), this thriller focuses on disparate families on both sides of
the U.S./Mexican border as they're touched by the narcotics trade. Inspired by
a six-hour, U.K. miniseries called Traffik (1989), this examination of
the cocaine business is intelligently scripted by Stephen Gaghan and deftly
directed by Steven Soderbergh. Three main narrative threads intersect and
branch off as the film unfolds. In Mexico, straight-arrow cop Javier (Benicio
Del Toro) and his partner, Manolo (Jacob Vargas), join forces with General
Arturo Salazar (Tomas Milian), who claims he wants to smash the big-time drug
cartel run by the Obregon brothers, Juan (Benjamin Bratt) and Pablo (Jsu
Garcia). Javier quickly begins to suspect Salazar's motives, but can't easily
extricate himself from Salazar's circle. In San Diego, DEA agents Ray Castro
(Luis Guzman) and Montel Gordon (Don Cheadle) bust mid-level dealer Eduardo
Ruiz (Miguel Ferrer) and persuade him to roll over on bigwig Carlos Ayala
(Steven Bauer), whose prosperous, suburban life is paid for by drugs. Ayala's
hugely pregnant wife (Catherine Zeta-Jones) must make hard decisions about her
future in the wake of her husband's arrest. And in Ohio, State Supreme Court
Justice Robert Wakefield (Michael Douglas), newly appointed as the country's drug czar, is blissfully unaware that his daughter, Caroline (Erika
Christensen), is freebasing with her boyfriend (Topher Grace). Together, these
stories paint a portrait of the drug trade from virtually every point of view:
Street-level dealers, junkies, international traffickers, policy makers, cops,
undercover agents, judges, casual users, politicians and customs agents.
Soderbergh gives the film a harsh but stylized look, manipulating color
(scraped-looking sepia for the Southwestern sequences, icy blue for Ohio and
Washington, DC), and using available light and handheld camera. Though
meticulously researched, well acted and filled with striking moments, the
movie ultimately feels oddly disconnected, perhaps because decades of magazine, newspaper and TV coverage of America's drug war may have exhausted interest in even as astute a treatment as this. --Maitland McDonagh
