Caution, dangerous roads ahead

Rarely does a film about illegal substances, guns and cops trigger much creative thinking. Far from a mind-numbing joy ride into thugs and drugs, "Traffic" is thoroughly entertaining and engaging, a triumphant movie emerging from the river of filth that has flowed from Hollywood the last few months.\n"Traffic" portrays the flow of drugs in every element, floating between the warring Mexican drug cartels, the wealthy U.S. distributors, the drug enforcers on both sides of the border and the red-eyed suburban kids who couldn't just say no. Although disjointed in the beginning, the separate stories intermingle into a powerful narrative on the war on drugs. \nThe scope of "Traffic" is enormous, laden with characters, tones, messages and subtle nuances. Benicio Del Toro and Don Cheadle register the strongest performances as drug enforcers in Mexico and the United States respectively. Cheadle and his partner add humor to the film while Erika Christensen, who plays the drug-abusing daughter of Michael Douglas' drug czar character, portrays innocence. Catherine Zeta-Jones' character, by far not the strongest of the talented cast, is still delightful to watch as she discovers the true nature of her wealthy husband's business. \nEvery aspect of production represents a successful mixture. The plot of "Traffic" has a good balance of plot twists and expected outcomes. One minute the audience is safely viewing the detached press conferences in Washington, D.C., the next minute it's whisked away to a sniper slowly taking aim at the prosecution's key witness. The film editors do a masterful job of interweaving the stories, lingering on one person's face while shifting to the audio of another character. Effects like washed-out lighting, blurry focus and grainy video drift in and out to give parts of "Traffic" a documentary feel. \nExcept for a cameo by Sen. Orrin Hatch, there really isn't anything bad about this movie. All fans of stimulating cinema owe it to themselves to see "Traffic"