Traffick :: essays papers

barterk This saga of the supposed war on drugs is a masterwork of superb performance, smart writing--and, most of all, the visage of a director who non only knows what he wants, but also exactly how to make his ambitious vision a glorious veritableity. opposed most multicharacter pastiches, such as the ones made by Robert Altman, or capital of Minnesota Thomas Andersons Magnolia, the characters of Traffics three tales dont constantly crisscross, nor are they all brought together by a big event. Intersections are rare in Traffic, and the junctions that do make it are often fleeting. Yet the stories are strongly linked by their greater thematic concern to vividly illustrate how the drug problem touches all corners of the country, all walks of life, from people on the harsh urban streets to those in lavish upper-class neighborhoods. Soderbergh and writer Stephen Gaghan, working from the 80s British miniseries Traffik, steadfastly jib to force easy, comforting conclusions from difficult and complex situations as in real life, one is left to decide for oneself who or what is right, and what it all means. While Traffic is essentially about the war on drugs in America, the films starting designate is the almost-exclusively south-of-the-border (and nearly-completely Spanish-language) story of Javier Rodriguez (Benicio Del Toro, doing away with his annoying tics and delivering a career performance), an average Tijuana verbalize policeman who is given the opportunity for greater prestige by working for General Salazars (Tomas Milian) efforts against the drug cartels. Just north of the border in San Diego is the context for another thread, in which very pregnant European migr Helena Ayala (Catherine Zeta-Jones, her real-life hold back adding a deeper layer to her role) learns that the pampered lifestyle provided by husband Carlos (Steven Bauer) comes from dabblings in drugs, not legit business ventures. The film also travels a bit northwest to Cinc innati, the threesome central locale, where Caroline (Erika Christensen), the teenage daughter of newly-appointed U.S. drug czar Robert Wakefield (Michael Douglas), brings her fathers opposition much closer to home than he could have ever imagined. Soderbergh effortlessly weaves the individual strands into a tapestry that is at once cohesive and characterized by its contrasting colors. The latter can be taken in a literal sense--Soderbergh, under the pseudonym Peter Andrews (his fathers name), shot the film himself, and he gave each part of the film its own distinct look grainy, attenuated yellow for Mexico a solemn blue sheen for Cincinnati sun-drenched plentiful color for San Diego.