The best thing one can say about the film "Traffic" is that it brought attention to the superior British mini-series "Traffik". As many people have noted, the current film suffers from truncating the story to accommodate the short attention span of cinema-goers and the turn-around time of the theater owners, who measure a film's success by the overpriced food sales.
I first recorded this mini series in 1990 when it was shown on Public TV, later purchased the DVD, and have watched it many times. The whole documentary-style series has a strong element of tragedy and doom about it, as the characters are all moving toward their eventual fate. The strongest of the three tales is that of the Pakistani family forced into the City to find a way to keep body and soul together after the poppy crop is burned by the army in a staged show of force put on for the benefit of western politicians. The hardships of the family are similar to that of the rickshaw puller's family in "City of Joy". Eventually the farmer finds work, but he compromises his pride and honesty.
The Pakistani segment of the film has a particular relevance to today, with the fight against the supporters of Al Quaeda, and gives some understanding of the support for such movements among the disadvantaged poor of Pakistan and Afghanistan who rarely receive any of the money going into those countries. The film makes a point that the farmers see barely 25% of the aid which is supposed to encourage them to grow other crops.
With the American inability to see anything other than in terms of black and white - good guys v. bad guys - it is interesting to see another view where there is no black and white, only shades of grey.
Possible spoiler ahead. The only problem I had with the story was that rather than things continuing as they did before, as they would in real life, being a work of fiction they had to wrap it up with the "bad guys" getting what was coming to them. Other than that, this was a fine piece of work of the kind we see all too rarely. The cast was outstanding and the German and Pakistani locations helped give the film a "different" feel (what a change it made seeing Germans as something other than the villains in a WWII film).
I particularly liked the slower pace of the intertwined stories which gave the viewer more time to identify with the characters, unlike the US TV series which followed the US film. Traffic the film was set in Mexico and by cutting out a Mexican peasant family trying to survive any way they can, they effectively robbed the film of its most emotionally effective storyline, turned it into a cops and robbers confrontation and destroyed the balance. I care more about a third world family trying to survive than I do about a spoiled rotten Western teenager taking to drugs.
Traffic, the TV series, returned to Afghanistan but concentrated on the smugglers rather than the small farmer, and was ruined for me by the fast editing and cutting, often within seconds, of the different story lines, not to mention the kick ass gung ho DEA cavalry.
In summation, Traffik while more than 30 years old now, benefits from being unable to take advantage of flashy modern film techniques and CGI, and takes the time to let the story unfold for a more absorbing experience. It was more like reading a good book than looking at pictures in a graphic novel.
I first recorded this mini series in 1990 when it was shown on Public TV, later purchased the DVD, and have watched it many times. The whole documentary-style series has a strong element of tragedy and doom about it, as the characters are all moving toward their eventual fate. The strongest of the three tales is that of the Pakistani family forced into the City to find a way to keep body and soul together after the poppy crop is burned by the army in a staged show of force put on for the benefit of western politicians. The hardships of the family are similar to that of the rickshaw puller's family in "City of Joy". Eventually the farmer finds work, but he compromises his pride and honesty.
The Pakistani segment of the film has a particular relevance to today, with the fight against the supporters of Al Quaeda, and gives some understanding of the support for such movements among the disadvantaged poor of Pakistan and Afghanistan who rarely receive any of the money going into those countries. The film makes a point that the farmers see barely 25% of the aid which is supposed to encourage them to grow other crops.
With the American inability to see anything other than in terms of black and white - good guys v. bad guys - it is interesting to see another view where there is no black and white, only shades of grey.
Possible spoiler ahead. The only problem I had with the story was that rather than things continuing as they did before, as they would in real life, being a work of fiction they had to wrap it up with the "bad guys" getting what was coming to them. Other than that, this was a fine piece of work of the kind we see all too rarely. The cast was outstanding and the German and Pakistani locations helped give the film a "different" feel (what a change it made seeing Germans as something other than the villains in a WWII film).
I particularly liked the slower pace of the intertwined stories which gave the viewer more time to identify with the characters, unlike the US TV series which followed the US film. Traffic the film was set in Mexico and by cutting out a Mexican peasant family trying to survive any way they can, they effectively robbed the film of its most emotionally effective storyline, turned it into a cops and robbers confrontation and destroyed the balance. I care more about a third world family trying to survive than I do about a spoiled rotten Western teenager taking to drugs.
Traffic, the TV series, returned to Afghanistan but concentrated on the smugglers rather than the small farmer, and was ruined for me by the fast editing and cutting, often within seconds, of the different story lines, not to mention the kick ass gung ho DEA cavalry.
In summation, Traffik while more than 30 years old now, benefits from being unable to take advantage of flashy modern film techniques and CGI, and takes the time to let the story unfold for a more absorbing experience. It was more like reading a good book than looking at pictures in a graphic novel.