MOVIE REVIEW: DEPP'S BLOW KIND OF SUCKS

Blow stars Johnny Depp in a biopic about George Jung, a man who claims that
in the late 1970s he imported about 85 per cent of all the cocaine in America.

That made him the greatest success story in drugs, an industry that has
inspired more movies than any other. So why is he such a sad sack? Why is
his life so monotonous and disappointing?

That's what he'd like to know. The last shot in the film shows the real
George Jung staring out at us from the screen like a man buried alive in
his own regrets.

Jung makes a lot of money but has an uncanny ability to get arrested.
Franka Potente (from Run, Lola, Run) is his first wife, Penelope Cruz is
his second, Paul Reubens is his business partner, and Cliff Curtis is Pablo
Escobar, but Goodfellas star Ray Liotta, as his father, is a reminder that
lesser drug dealers have inspired better movies.

The opening chapters in the life of Jung tell a story of small risk and
great joy, especially if your idea of a good time is having all the money
you can possibly spend and hopelessly conventional ideas about how to spend
it. George never actually planned to become a drug dealer and is a little
bemused at his good luck. The later chapters of his life grow increasingly
depressing.

The dreary story of his final defeats is a record of back-stabbing and
broken trusts and, although there is a certain poignancy in his final
destiny, it is tempered by our knowledge that millions of lives had to be
destroyed by addiction so that George and his onetime friends could arrive
at their crossroads.

The movie, directed by Ted Demme and written by David McKenna and Nick
Cassavetes (from an as-told-to book by Bruce Porter), is well-made and
well-acted.

As a story of the rise and fall of this man, it serves. Johnny Depp is a
versatile and reliable actor who almost always chooses interesting projects.

The failure is Jung's. For all the glory of his success and the pathos of
his failure, he never became a person interesting enough to make a movie
about. Al Pacino's Scarface has so much style he makes Jung look like a dry
goods clerk. Which essentially he was. Take away the drugs and this is the
story of a boring life in wholesale.

REVIEW

Blow

Rating two 1/2 (out of four)

14A: Violence, coarse language

Playing at: Capitol 6, Colossus, Criterion Eagle Ridge, White Rock, Dunbar,
Grande, Granville, New West, Oakridge, Park & Tilford, SilverCity
Coquitlam, SC Guildford, SC Metropolis, SC Mission, SC Riverport, Towne
Cinema Abbotsford