Intelligent and highly thought-provoking.
Traffic (2000)
Runtime: 2 hrs 28 mins
Synopsis: Steven Soderbergh followed up his critical and commercial smash ERIN BROCKOVICH with this wildly exhilarating exploration of the complex, multilayered international drug problem, based on a 1989 British TV mini-series. The film tells three seemingly disparate stories that loosely... Steven Soderbergh followed up his critical and commercial smash ERIN BROCKOVICH with this wildly exhilarating exploration of the complex, multilayered international drug problem, based on a 1989 British TV mini-series. The film tells three seemingly disparate stories that loosely intersect and overlap, unfurling at a frantic, relentless pace. In the first, a well-intentioned Mexican police officer, Javier Rodriguez Rodriguez (Benicio Del Toro), comes face-to-face with the hypocrisy and hopelessness of his situation after he learns that his superior, General Salazar (Tomas Milian), isn't the law-abiding officer he claims to be. In the second, Robert Wakefield (Michael Douglas), a conservative Supreme Court judge from Ohio, takes a position as the president's new drug czar. What he doesn't realize is that his teenage daughter, Caroline (Erika Christensen), is falling prey to the dangerous narcotics that he has been hired to eradicate. In the third section, federal agents Montel Gordon (Don Cheadle) and Ray Castro (Luis Guzmán) are baby-sitting Eduardo Ruiz (Miguel Ferrer), a drug smuggler who is about to testify against the wealthy Carlos Ayala (Steven Bauer). When Ayala's pregnant wife, Helena (Catherine Zeta-Jones), learns of her husband's illegal activities, she takes her family's future into her own hands. Soderbergh's bold decision to photograph the film using three strikingly different visual schemes adds even greater punch to TRAFFIC, which stands firmly as one of 2000's most stirring motion picture events. [More]
Genre: Dramas
Starring: Michael Douglas, Benicio Del Toro, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Don Cheadle, Luis Guzmán
Screenwriter: Stephen Gaghan
Producer: Laura Bickford, Edward Zwick, Marshall Herskovitz
Composer: Cliff Martinez
DVD Info
Release:
Dec 9, 2006
HD-DVD Features:
- Red HD Case
- Widescreen - 1.85
Audio:
- Dolby Digital Surround Sound Plus 5.1 - English
- Dolby Digital Surround Sound Plus 2.0 - English
- Subtitles - English SDH, French, Spanish - Optional
Additional Release Material:
- Trailers - 1. US Teaser Trailer
- 2. US Trailer
- 3. German Trailer
- 4. TV Spots
- Featurettes - 1. "Inside TRAFFIC"
Text and Photo Galleries:
- Photo Gallery
Reviews
It's wise about different kinds of addiction and concepts of family, about the folly, futility and hypocrisy of anti-drug 'wars', and about the awful human cost of it all. And it grips like a vice from start to end.
Brilliantly-made, impeccably acted, already tipped for Oscars -- this is easily one of the best films you’ll see this year.
It should be mandatory viewing for absolutely everyone ... especially those involved in the war on drugs.
A sprawling, artistic, superbly acted, informative, and mainstream Hollywood movie.
Although its vigorous, unjaded rush of imagery and story makes for an exciting visual experience, Steven Soderbergh's Traffic is in the end a fatally sober film about drugs.
In considering so many angles regarding his subject, Soderbergh and his writers have created a bold act of filmmaking -- passionate drama on a grand canvas.
Soderbergh's electrifying pace always keeps this huge project firmly on the rails, always moving, always running.
Le film de Steven Soderbergh et Stephen Gaghan est visiblement le fruit d'un travail de recherche exhaustif et d'une démarche narrative tout aussi réfléchie et cohérente.
I don't see this slightly better-than-average drug thriller, with slightly better-than-average direction by Steven Soderbergh, as anything more than a routine rubber-stamping of genre reflexes.
Traffic is one of those square-up-the-middle tracts that make people think they're thinking.
Mr. Soderburgh never insults or spoon-feeds his audience. His camera only documents and observes what's out there. And with a subject like this, that can be the most effective technique.
By Hollywood standards, this is a decently written, well-made social problem picture, but it's not nearly as harsh, critical and effective as Traffik, the 5-hour British mini-series upon which Gaghan's script is based.
You may agree with its message, and be impressed by the camerawork. But this movie is stretched too thin and eventually asks us to accept some pretty ludicrous twists.
It feels like watching pieces move on a chessboard without human agency, without psychological desire.
This close dissection of the arguably inneffectual drug war being fought by the US government is so complex, so intricate, that I am surprised that the film has met with commercial success.
One of the best movies of the year: a gripping, intelligent and ambitious drama about drug trafficking and the misguided war against it.
Director Steven Soderbergh is riding one of the hottest streaks in the movie world.
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