Dir: Steven Sodebergh
Starring
Benicio Del Toro
Michael Douglas
Catherine-Zeta Jones
Don Cheadle
Luis Guzman
2000
R, 147 m
RATING: 7 out of 10
Call Traffic a mixture a mixture of 1999's masterful, emotional Magnolia and The Insider's slow, but utterly effective character study. However, take away the smooth story and cinematography transitions from character to character in Magnolia and The Insider's thoughtful, meaningful slow movement and solitude, and you get Traffic. Not to say Traffic is a bad film - it never gets preachy of goes the way of Oliver Stone and turns into a loud diatribe. What is missing, however, is a charge of electricity that never truly gets the thrills going.
What Traffic lacks in solid storytelling it makes up for in a heap of fantastic performances, most notably Benicio del Toro's turn as Javier Rodriguez Rodriguez, caught between serving his personal belief on the drug war and being loyal to a countryman. Don Cheadle and Luis Guzman serve up two witty characters, and this is easily Miguel Ferrer's best role since 1987's Robocop. As a dealer-turned-state witness, he is coldy convincing as he spouts his disgust in the government and their futile stance against drugs.
That's Soderbergh's main message, and again, thankfully, we are not beaten over the head with it: the war on drugs is futile and the best prevention from addiction comes from the support of family and friends, not from a billion dollar government project to stop drugs from entering the country and taking down cartels.
Despite its loose, meandering, and mostly unsuccessful interweaving storylines, Soderberh managels to illicit some potent performances from his cast. Traffic could have benifitted from some heavy trimming and some faster pacing. Then, not only could it have been an important film, but an entertaining one as well.
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