POWERFUL MOVIE DISSECTS US DRUG SCOURGE

Traffic

Director - Steven Soderbergh. Actors - Benicio Del Toro, Michael Douglas,
Catherine Zeta-Jones, Don Cheadle, Dennis Quaid, Erika Christensen, Albert
Finney. Rating - M.

Director Steven Soderbergh came to attention in 1989 with Sex, Lies, and
Videotape but his follow up movies were all flops. Then seemingly out of
the blue he made Out of Sight which showed that Jennifer Lopez can act when
locked in a car boot with George Cooney. He followed that with Erin
Brockovich which showed that Julia Roberts can act when wearing a push-up
bra. And now he has made Traffic (Hoyts), a powerful film about the grip
that drugs have on western society that also shows that Catherine
Zeta-Jones can act and have Michael Douglas's baby all at the same time.

This hat trick sees him Oscar nominated twice for best director for Erin
Brockovich and Traffic. Traffic is a terrific film that takes a massive
subject, drugs, and gives us an intimate insight into the whole game of
snakes and ladders.

Tijuana policeman Javier Rodriquex (Benicio Del Toro) never meets Robert
Wakefield (Michael Douglas), the newly appointed American anti-drug czar,
or socialite Helena Ayala (Catherine Zeta-Jones), whose husband has just
been arrested as a drugs king pin, yet they are all linked by the cocaine
that is smuggled out of Tijuana.

All three suddenly have drugs thrust to the forefront of their lives and
they each struggle through in their individual ways to return to normality.

Wakefield, while he jets around the country learning about drug
enforcement, has a teenage daughter who has moved beyond experimenting. The
war has entered his family and all his certainties are gone. Helena sees
her country club lifestyle slipping away from her and she moves forcefully
to retain what her husband has built. Javier is an enigma. A poor cop
forced into corruption or is he?

Again Soderbergh shows his skill in getting actors to show more than they
had previously seemed capable of. The plotting of the inter-connecting
story works well but it is the expressions on the faces that sticks in the
memory more than the twists in the narrative.