4/5
Steven Soderbergh's Traffic weaves an intricate, spellbinding tale that is nearly impossible to take your eyes off of for its entire 2.5 hour running time. The plotting is impeccable, keeping you engaged whether detailing the intricacies of drug consumption or the complex involvement of governments on drug trafficking. The stories, as penned by Stephen Gaghan, are eye-opening and richly-textured. We are thrust into a collection of environments so authentic that we cannot help but take the events that pass as reality. We become involved and complicit; we end up shaken and unclean. Every person has a little bit of good in them and a little bit of bad in them, making decisions equal parts wrong and equal parts right. There are heart-breaking scenes in here, made all the more powerful thanks to superb acting, that combine with profound and provocative ideas to bring home a very specific message: the war on drugs is a lost cause. The film ends on a solemn, haunting note, showing us characters continuing to fight a battle that will never end and will only take more lives. Everything feels so overwhelming, and we are all so helpless to effect change.
But despite my high praise, the movie also fails on a number of levels. Honestly, I hated the editing. The pacing was practically non-existent, with innumerable superfluous scenes cut together haphazardly. (Not that the movie was boring per se, just that there was about 30 minutes of extra footage meandering throughout its nonlinear storyline.) The editing was almost as bad as some of Soderbergh's directing decisions. Really? Blue, orange, and red? That's your big contribution to the story? I'm not saying it's not a well-directed movie from other standpoints, just that the colors were a bit too in-your-face for me. It was about as subtle as a sledgehammer. But Soderbergh still somehow manages to fill our minds and our hearts to their breaking point, giving us a timely and timeless story that is both absorbing and poignant. And also unforgettable.
IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0181865/