Honest Drugs.(A review of the motion picture 'Traffic')(Review)

Sometimes movies earn their keep by providing a picture of where we stand. When it comes to preventing the illegal drug trade, we stand on shaky ground--every inch of which is covered by the ambitious and exhaustive Traffic.

Proponents of drug legalization have rushed to claim Traffic as their own; Rolling Stone, for instance, heralds the film as part of a tradition of "scorching muckrakers." But observers with less smoke in their eyes will see that the movie gives just about everyone his say. Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) agents, traffickers, addicts, and the U.S. anti-drug czar all weigh in during the course of this sprawling fictional story. There's even a scene at a Washington cocktail party in which the wandering camera catches real-life politicians spouting off on the issue. ("Stand up and be independent," Republican Senator Orrin Hatch tells the newly appointed czar. "Use your bully pulpit.")

Traffic remains independent throughout, acknowledging the havoc created by our drug trade, the necessity of controlling it, and the mistakes that can be made trying to do just that. The movie's far-ranging narrative intertwines stories that cover everything from affluent teenage addicts in suburban Cincinnati to corrupt officers in the Mexican army. The movie jumps from bleached deserts to cool blue corridors in Washington, D.C., all tied together by director Stephen Soderbergh's inventive use of quick edits and overlapping dialogue. The whole thing plays like a state of the union speech peppered with cinematic pizzazz.

Based on a series that originally aired on British television, Traffic strikes chords both home and abroad. In Mexico, the movie follows a side-dealing street cop, played with conflicted weariness by Benicio Del Toro, who's forced to decide just how much his morals will bend when he's tapped by a Mexican general to help wage war against a Tijuana drug lord. (It turns out the general's on the payroll of a rival dealer.) "In Mexico, law enforcement is an entrepreneurial activity" one character says, echoing the greedy desperation in Del Toro's eyes.

The situation is not as corrupt in the States, but it can be just as dispiriting. Exuding grit and determination, Luis Guzman and Don Cheadle play DEA agents who have nabbed a mid-level dealer in San Diego and are now on the hunt for his boss. In a ...