Traffic

“Traffic,” Steven Soderbergh’s somber and electric new movie, is all about grieving. Wives grieve for husbands, parents grieve for children, cops grieve for partners, drug lords grieve for lost profits, politicians grieve for their careers, and citizens grieve for their nations and their lost kids. Soderbergh burst onto the scene in 1989 with “Sex, Lies, and Videotape,” and since then he has moved to the front rank of directors by virtue of his talent and versatility. In “Traffic” he has crafted a jarring and memorable look at the ambiguities and failures of United States drug enforcement policy. Moreover, he has done so without taking an overtly political stance, and he never forgets to entertain his audience. The film is not quite a polemic, but it is more than a thriller. The superb script, by Stephen Gaghan (who also wrote “Rules of Engagement”), is adapted from a British miniseries called “Traffik” (written by Simon Moore). It follows three separate narrative lines, which intersect in tangential ways. Soderbergh manages his large and superlative cast brilliantly. Each character emerges as a distinct personality, and we never lose sight of what is happening to whom.

In the first story, two more or less honest Mexican cops, Javier (a superb Del Toro), and Manolo (Vargas) are sucked into the vortex of corruption and greed that characterizes the drug trade in Mexico (and, some would argue, in the U.S. as well). In a world in which a human life has no value at all, they struggle to maintain their bearings, to see the truth through the haze of deception, and to balance the conflicting motivations of greed and loyalty. We, along with the two cops, are confronted with a moral landscape in which things are never quite what they seem. In the second story, Midwestern judge Robert Wakefield (Douglas) is appointed the new head of United States drug policy (the “drug czar”) and travels to Washington to begin his new career. Back home in Cincinnati, his daughter Caroline (Christensen), along with her wealthy white classmates, is immersed in the world of recreational drug use, and gradually slips into addiction. Wakefield must then confront the challenges of national drug policy while bedeviled by the effects of drugs at the most personal level.

The third story takes place in lovely, upscale San Diego, where two cops, Montel Gordon (Cheadle) and Ray Castro (Guzman) capture a midlevel drug distributor (Ferrer), who then reluctantly agrees to testify against his boss, Carlos Ayala (Bauer). Ayala is arrested, at which point his wife Helena (Zeta-Jones), must discover her inner dragon-lady to reclaim the life she feels has been unfairly taken from her. All of these story lines contain additional layers, which twist back upon themselves in a manner that reflects the dimensions and conundrums of the drug problem. Summarized thusly, “Traffic” may seem confusingly busy and hard to follow. On the contrary, the film is razor sharp, and its carefully constructed narratives throw into harsh relief the sharp edges of the drug debate. Much has also been made of the look of the film, which Soderbergh himself photographed (under the pseudonym Peter Andrews). He adopts a different visual style for each section: dingy brown for the Mexican portions, cool gray-blue for Cincinnati and Washington D.C., and vivid primary colors for San Diego. Handheld camera is a technique which has often been overused, abused, and misused, but it is wielded to excellent effect here. The jerky, cinema verité style captures the energy of the scenes without, as often happens in less skilled hands, losing the viewer.

Visually, we always know what is happening, even if morally the whole thing is nothing but a horrific morass. Soderbergh crams the screen full of so much energy and visual interest that the film grabs you from the first moment and never lets go. Gaghan and Soderbergh carefully avoid any mention of legalization or decriminalization. They are scrupulously objective throughout, presenting the images and stories and letting the viewers draw their own conclusions. Strictly speaking, the film is apolitical (despite the roster of Washington, D.C. luminaries who play themselves in cameo appearances). Still, there are any number of telling moments, which speak volumes about just what the stakes are. At a rehab meeting, Caroline says, “At my age, it’s easier to get drugs than alcohol.” (Why? Because, of course, alcohol is regulated, taxed, and legal.) In another scene, an arrogant preppie, one of Caroline’s classmates, lectures Wakefield about the economics of the drug trade, and as much as Wakefield (as well as the audience) probably wants to punch him in the nose, he cannot refute the kid’s statements. Similarly, drug dealer Ruiz (Ferrer) displays a surprisingly broad and intelligent perspective as he lectures Montel and Ray on the impossibility of their task.

Wakefield takes a field trip to the front lines on the U.S.-Mexico border to see for himself what is happening there. On the flight back, he asks his plane full of smart policy people to “think outside the box” about the drug problem. Nobody says anything. Not one word. That moment of silence says more about the contradictions, futility, and costs of the drug war than a dozen headlines. Gaghan and Soderbergh have teamed up to make a knockout film, one that entertains, yes, but also forces us to stare right into the uncomfortable heart of a problem that will not go away. (1/9/2001)