Traffic (2000 film)

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Traffic
Traffic2000Poster.jpg
Theatrical release poster
Directed by Steven Soderbergh
Screenplay by Stephen Gaghan
Based on Traffik
by Simon Moore
Produced by
Starring
Cinematography Peter Andrews
Edited by Stephen Mirrione
Music by Cliff Martinez
Production
companies
Distributed by
  • USA Films (United States and Canada)
  • Initial Entertainment Group (International) [1]
Release date
  • December 27, 2000 (2000-12-27)(United States)
Running time
147 minutes
CountryUnited States
Languages
  • English
  • Spanish
Budget$48 million [2]
Box office$207.5 million [3]

Traffic is a 2000 American crime drama film directed by Steven Soderbergh and written by Stephen Gaghan. It explores the illegal drug trade from several perspectives: users, enforcers, politicians, and traffickers. Their stories are edited together throughout the film, although some characters do not meet each other. The film is an adaptation of the 1989 British Channel 4 television series Traffik . The film stars an international ensemble cast, including Don Cheadle, Benicio del Toro, Michael Douglas, Erika Christensen, Luis Guzmán, Dennis Quaid, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Jacob Vargas, Tomas Milian, Topher Grace, James Brolin, Steven Bauer, and Benjamin Bratt. It features both English and Spanish-language dialogue.

Contents

20th Century Fox, the original financiers of the film, demanded that Harrison Ford play a leading role and that significant changes to the screenplay be made. Soderbergh refused and proposed the script to other major Hollywood studios; it was rejected because of the three-hour running time and the subject matter—Traffic is more of a political film than most Hollywood productions. [4] USA Films, however, liked the project from the start and offered the filmmakers more money than Fox. Soderbergh operated the camera himself and adopted a distinctive color grade for each storyline so that audiences could tell them apart.

Traffic was released in the United States on December 27, 2000, and received critical acclaim for Soderbergh's direction, the film's style, complexity, messages, and the cast's performances (particularly del Toro's). Traffic earned numerous awards, including four Oscars (from five nominations): Best Director for Steven Soderbergh, Best Supporting Actor for Benicio del Toro, Best Adapted Screenplay for Stephen Gaghan and Best Film Editing for Stephen Mirrione. It was also a commercial success with a worldwide box-office revenue total of $207.5 million, well above its estimated $46 million budget.

In 2004, USA Network ran a miniseries—also called Traffic —based on the film and the 1989 British television series.

Plot

Mexico storyline

In Mexico, police officer Javier Rodriguez and his partner Manolo Sanchez stop a drug transport and arrest the couriers. General Salazar, a high-ranking Mexican official, interrupts their arrest to offer Javier a special new assignment. Salazar instructs him to apprehend Francisco Flores, a hitman for the Tijuana Cartel, headed by the Obregón brothers.

In Tijuana, under torture, Flores gives Salazar the names of important members of the Obregón cartel, who are arrested. Javier and Salazar's efforts eventually cripple the Obregón brothers' cocaine outfit, but Javier soon discovers that Salazar is a pawn of the Juárez Cartel, the Obregón brothers' chief rival. It's revealed that Salazar's anti-drug campaign is a fraud, and his true goal is actually to wipe out the Juárez Cartel's competitors.

Sanchez attempts to sell information about Salazar's true affiliation to the Drug Enforcement Administration, but Salazar discovers his plot and has him murdered in the desert while Javier is forced to watch. No longer able to handle working for Salazar, Javier arranges a deal with the DEA to testify against him. In exchange for his testimony, Javier requests electricity in his neighborhood so that the local children can play baseball at night rather than be tempted by street gangs and crime. Salazar's secrets are revealed, and he is arrested.

Javier makes a statement to the media about the widespread corruption in the police force and army. Later, Javier watches as children play baseball at night in their new stadium.

Wakefield storyline

Robert Wakefield, a conservative Ohio judge, is appointed to head the President's Office of National Drug Control Policy, taking on the title of drug czar. His predecessor and several influential politicians warn Wakefield that the War on Drugs is unwinnable. Meanwhile, Robert's teenage daughter Caroline, an honors student, has been using cocaine, methamphetamine, and heroin, which develops into a drug addiction after her boyfriend Seth introduces her to freebasing. Caroline, Seth, and their friend Vanessa are all arrested when a fellow student overdoses on drugs, and they try to dump him anonymously at a hospital. Robert and his wife Barbara struggle to deal with Caroline's addiction, which Barbara has secretly known about for over six months.

Robert finds himself caught between his demanding new position and difficult family life. During a visit to Mexico, he is encouraged by Salazar's successful efforts in hurting the Obregón brothers. Returning to Ohio, Robert learns that Caroline has run away to Cincinnati after stealing money from her parents to pay for drugs, and no one knows her exact location.

Robert drags Seth along as he begins to search Cincinnati for his daughter. After a drug dealer who is prostituting Caroline refuses to reveal her whereabouts, Robert breaks into a seedy hotel room and finds a semi-conscious Caroline in the company of an older man. Later, he returns to Washington, D.C. to give his prepared speech on a "10-point plan" to win the War on Drugs, but falters halfway through the speech. Before exiting the conference, he tells the press that the War on Drugs implies a war on one's own family, which he cannot endorse. Later, Robert and Barbara attend a Narcotics Anonymous meeting with Caroline. When invited to introduce themselves to the group, Robert and Barbara tell the other attendees that they're "here to listen".

Ayala/DEA storyline

In San Diego, an undercover DEA investigation led by Montel Gordon and Ray Castro leads to the arrest of Eduardo Ruiz, a high-stakes dealer posing as a fisherman. Ruiz decides to take the road to immunity by giving up his boss: drug lord Carl Ayala, the biggest distributor for the Obregón brothers in the United States. Ayala is indicted by a tough prosecutor, hand-selected by Robert Wakefield to send a message to the Mexican drug organizations.

As the trial against Ayala begins, his pregnant wife Helena learns of her husband's true profession from his associate, Arnie Metzger. Facing the prospect of life imprisonment for her husband and death threats against her only child, Helena decides to hire Francisco Flores to assassinate Eduardo Ruiz; she knows killing Ruiz will effectively end the trial nolle prosequi . Flores plants a car bomb on a DEA car in an assassination attempt against Ruiz. Shortly after planting the bomb, Flores is assassinated by a sniper in retaliation for his cooperation with General Salazar. The bomb meant to kill Ruiz instead kills Agent Castro. Gordon and Ruiz survive.

Knowing Ruiz is soon scheduled to testify, Helena makes a deal with drug lord Juan Obregón, who forgives the Ayala family's debt and has Ruiz poisoned. Ayala is released, much to the dissatisfaction of Gordon, who is still angry over Castro's death. Ayala eventually deduces that Metzger initially informed on Ruiz. In a bid for power with another drug cartel in Mexico, Metzger accepted $3 million to inform on Ruiz to the FBI and facilitate the Ayala organization's downfall. According to Ayala, Metzger was planning on taking over Ayala's empire completely. Metzger is later visited by two men with guns. Soon after Ayala's release, Gordon bursts into the Ayala home during his homecoming celebration. Bodyguards wrestle him to the ground, but Gordon surreptitiously plants a listening bug under Ayala's desk. Gordon is forced from the property, smiling as he walks away.

Relationship to actual events

Some aspects of the plotline are based on actual people and events:

At one point in the film, an El Paso Intelligence Center agent tells Robert his position, official in charge of drug control, doesn't exist in Mexico. As noted in the original script, a Director of the Instituto Nacional para el Combate a las Drogas was created by the Attorney General of Mexico in 1996.

Cast

Production

Development

Steven Soderbergh had been interested in making a film about the drug wars for some time but did not want to make one about addicts. [8] Producer Laura Bickford obtained the rights to the British television miniseries Traffik (1989) and liked its structure. Soderbergh, who had seen the miniseries in 1990, [9] started looking for a screenwriter to adapt it into a film. They read a script by Stephen Gaghan called Havoc , about upper-class white kids in Palisades High School doing drugs and getting involved with gangs. [10] Soderbergh approached Gaghan to work on his film but found he was already developing a film about drugs for producer/director Edward Zwick. Bickford and Soderbergh approached Zwick, who agreed to merge the two projects and come aboard as a producer. [8]

Traffic was originally going to be distributed by 20th Century Fox, but it was put into turnaround unless actor Harrison Ford agreed to star. Soderbergh began shopping the film to other studios, but when Ford suddenly showed interest in Traffic, Fox's interest in the film was renewed; the studio took it out of turnaround. [11] Fox CEO Bill Mechanic championed the film, but he departed from the studio by the time the first draft was finished. It went back into turnaround. [12] Mechanic had also wanted to make some changes to the script, but Soderbergh disagreed [2] and decided to shop the film to other major studios. They all turned him down because they were not confident in the prospects of a three-hour film about drugs, according to Gaghan. [10] USA Films, however, had wanted to take on the movie from the first time Soderbergh approached them. [12] They provided the filmmakers with a $46 million budget, a considerable increase from the $25 million which Fox offered. [2]

Screenplay

Soderbergh had "conceptual discussions" with Gaghan while he was shooting The Limey in October 1998; they finished the outline before he went off to shoot Erin Brockovich . [8] After Soderbergh was finished with that film, Gaghan had written a first draft in six weeks that was 165 pages long. [10] After the film was approved for production, Soderbergh and Gaghan met two separate times for three days to reformat the script. [10] The draft they shot had 163 pages with 135 speaking parts and featured seven cities. [8] The film shortens the storyline of the original mini-series; a significant character arc of a farmer is taken out, and the Pakistani plotline is replaced with one set in Mexico. [9]

Casting

Harrison Ford was initially considered for the role of Robert Wakefield in January 2000 but would have had to take a significant cut in his usual $20 million salary. [13] Ford met with Soderbergh to flesh out the character. Gaghan agreed to rework the role, adding several scenes to the screenplay. On February 20, Ford turned down the role, and the filmmakers brought it back to Michael Douglas, who had turned down an earlier draft. He liked the changes and agreed to star, which helped greenlight the project. [13] Gaghan believes Ford turned down the role because he wanted to "reconnect with his action fans". [10]

The filmmakers sent out letters to many politicians, both Democrat and Republican, asking them to make cameo appearances in the film. Several of the scenes had already been shot using actors in these roles, but the filmmakers went back and reshot those scenes when real politicians agreed to be in the film. [14] Those who agreed, including U.S. Senators Harry Reid, Barbara Boxer, Orrin Hatch, Charles Grassley, and Don Nickles, and Massachusetts governor Bill Weld, were filmed in a scene that was entirely improvised. [9]

Pre-production

The project was obtained from Fox by Initial Entertainment Group and was sold to USA Films by IEG for North American rights only. Steven Soderbergh never approached USA Films, and Initial Entertainment Group fully funded the film.

After Fox dropped the film in early 2000 and before USA Films expressed interest, Soderbergh paid for pre-production with his own money. [10] USA Films agreed to give him the final cut on Traffic and also agreed to his term that all the Mexican characters would speak Spanish while talking to each other. [13] This meant that almost all of Benicio del Toro's dialogue would be subtitled. Once the studio realized this, they suggested that his scenes be shot in English and Spanish, but Soderbergh and del Toro rejected the suggestion. [13] Del Toro, a native of Puerto Rico, [15] was worried that another actor would be brought in and re-record his dialogue in English after he had worked hard to master Mexican inflections and improve his Spanish vocabulary. Del Toro remembers, "Can you imagine? You do the whole movie, bust your butt to get it as realistic as possible, and someone dubs your voice? I said, 'No way. Over my dead body.' Steven was like, 'Don't worry. It's not gonna happen.'" [13] The director fought for subtitles for the Mexico scenes, arguing that if the characters did not speak Spanish, the film would have no integrity and would not convincingly portray what he described as the "impenetrability of another culture". [9]

The filmmakers went to the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and U.S. Customs early on with the script; they told them that they were trying to present as detailed and accurate a picture of the current drug war as possible. [9] The DEA and Customs pointed out inaccuracies in the script. In addition, they gave the production team access to the border checkpoint to Mexico, as shown in the film during the scene in which Wakefield and his people talk with border officials. Despite the assistance, the DEA did not try to influence the script's content. [9] Soderbergh said Traffic had influences from the films of Richard Lester and Jean-Luc Godard. He also spent time analyzing The Battle of Algiers and Z , which, according to the director, had the feeling that the footage was "caught" and not staged. [12] Another inspiration was Alan J. Pakula's film All the President's Men because of its ability to tackle serious issues while being entertaining. [16] In the opening credits of his film, Soderbergh tried to replicate the typeface from All the President's Men and the placement on-screen at the bottom left-hand corner. Analyzing this film helped the director deal with the large cast and working in many different locations for Traffic. [16]

Principal photography

Half of the first day's footage came out overexposed and unusable. [13] Before the financiers or studio bosses knew about the problem, Soderbergh was already doing reshoots. The insurers made him agree that any further mishaps resulting in additional filming would come from the director's pocket. [13] Soderbergh shot in various cities in California, Ohio, and Texas, on a 54-day schedule and came in $2 million under budget. [8] The director acted as his cinematographer under the pseudonym Peter Andrews and operated the camera himself to "get as close to the movie as I can" and to eliminate the distance between the actors and himself. [17] [8] Soderbergh drew inspiration from the cinema verite style of Ken Loach's films, studying the framing of scenes, the distance of the camera to the actors, lens length, and the tightness of eyelines depending on the position of a character. Soderbergh remembers, "I noticed that there's a space that's inviolate, that if you get within something, you cross the edge into a more theatrical aesthetic as opposed to a documentary aesthetic". [8] Most of the day was spent shooting because a lot of the film was shot with available light. [12]

For the hand-held camera footage, Soderbergh used Panavision Millennium XLs that were smaller and lighter than previous cameras and allowed him to move freely. [8] He adopted a distinctive look for each to tell the three stories apart. For Robert Wakefield's story, Soderbergh used tungsten film with no filter for a cold, monochrome blue feel. [8] For Helena Ayala's story, Soderbergh used diffusion filters, flashing the film and overexposing it for a warmer feel. For Javier Rodriguez's story, the director used tobacco filters and a 45-degree shutter angle whenever possible to produce a strobe-like sharp feeling. [8] Then, he took the entire film through an Ektachrome step, which increased the contrast and grain significantly. [8] He wanted different looks for each story because the audience had to keep track of many characters and absorb a lot of information, and he did not want them to have to figure out which story they were watching. [9]

Benicio del Toro had significant input into certain parts of the film; for example, he suggested a more straightforward, concise way of depicting his character kidnapping Francisco Flores that Soderbergh ended up using. [9] The director cut a scene from the screenplay in which Robert Wakefield smokes crack after finding it in his daughter's bedroom. After rehearsing this scene with the actors, he felt that the character would not do it; after consulting with Gaghan, the screenwriter agreed, and the filmmakers cut the scene shortly before it was scheduled to be shot. [10]

Balboa Park, Downtown San Diego and La Jolla were utilized as the environment for the film. [18]

Post-production

The first cut of Traffic ran three hours and ten minutes. [8] Soderbergh cut it to two hours and twenty minutes. Early on, there were concerns that the film might get an NC-17 rating, and he was prepared to release it with that rating, but the MPAA gave it an R. [8]

Release

Home media

In the United States, the film was released on DVD on May 28, 2002, by The Criterion Collection. [19] In Australia, Traffic was released on DVD by Village Roadshow, with an MA15+ rating. Despite the Australian packaging stating the length to be 124 minutes, the actual DVD version is just over 141 minutes long.

Reception

Box office performance

Traffic was given a limited release on December 27, 2000, in four theaters where it grossed US$184,725 on its opening weekend. It was given a wide release on January 5, 2001, in 1,510 theaters, grossing $15.5 million on its opening weekend. The film made $124.1 million in North America and $83.4 million in foreign markets for a worldwide total of $207.5 million, well above its estimated $46 million budget. [2] [20]

Critical response

On Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 93% based on 223 reviews, with an average rating of 8/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "Soderbergh successfully pulls off the highly ambitious Traffic, a movie with three different stories and a very large cast. The issues of ethics are gray rather than black-and-white, with no clear-cut good guys. Terrific acting all around." [21] On Metacritic the film has received an average score of 86 out of 100, based on 34 critics, indicating "universal acclaim". [22] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B" on an A+ to F scale. [23]

Film critic Roger Ebert gave the film four out of four stars and wrote, "The movie is powerful precisely because it doesn't preach. It is so restrained that at one moment—the judge's final speech—I wanted one more sentence, making a point, but the movie lets us supply that thought for ourselves". [24] Stephen Holden, in his review for The New York Times , wrote, "Traffic is an utterly gripping, edge-of-your-seat thriller. Or rather it is several interwoven thrillers, each with its own tense rhythm and explosive payoff". [25] In his review for The New York Observer , Andrew Sarris wrote, "Traffic marks [Soderbergh] definitively as an enormous talent, one who never lets us guess what he's going to do next. The promise of Sex, Lies, and Videotape has been fulfilled". [26]

Entertainment Weekly gave the film an "A" rating and praised Benicio del Toro's performance, which critic Owen Gleiberman called, "haunting in his understatement, [it] becomes the film's quietly awakening moral center". [27] Desson Howe, in his review for the Washington Post , wrote, "Soderbergh and screenwriter Stephen Gaghan, who based this on a British television miniseries of the same name, have created an often exhilarating, soup-to-nuts exposé of the world's most lucrative trade". [28] In his review for Rolling Stone , Peter Travers wrote, "The hand-held camerawork – Soderbergh himself did the holding—provides a documentary feel that rivets attention". [29] However, Richard Schickel of Time , in a rare negative review, finds the film's biggest weakness to be that it contains the "cliches of a hundred crime movies" before concluding that "Traffic, for all its earnestness, does not work. It leaves one feeling restless and dissatisfied". [30] In an interview, director Ingmar Bergman lauded the film as "amazing". [31]

Accolades

AwardCategoryRecipient(s)Result
Academy Awards [32] Best Picture Marshall Herskovitz, Edward Zwick and Laura Bickford Nominated
Best Director Steven Soderbergh Won
Best Supporting Actor Benicio del Toro Won
Best Screenplay – Based on Material Previously Produced or Published Stephen Gaghan Won
Best Film Editing Stephen Mirrione Won
ALMA Awards Outstanding Feature FilmWon
Outstanding Latino Cast in a Feature FilmWon
Outstanding Soundtrack or Compilation for Television and FilmNominated
Amanda Awards Best Foreign Feature FilmSteven SoderberghNominated
American Cinema Editors Awards Best Edited Feature Film – Dramatic Stephen MirrioneNominated
American Film Institute Awards [33] Top 10 Movies of the YearWon
Artios Awards [34] Outstanding Achievement in Feature Film Casting – Drama Debra Zane Won
Awards Circuit Community AwardsBest Motion PictureMarshall Herskovitz, Edward Zwick and Laura BickfordNominated
Best DirectorSteven SoderberghNominated
Best Actor in a Supporting RoleBenicio del ToroWon
Best Adapted ScreenplayStephen GaghanWon
Best CinematographySteven SoderberghNominated
Best Film EditingStephen MirrioneRunner-up
Best Cast EnsembleWon
Berlin International Film Festival [35] Golden Bear Steven SoderberghNominated
Best Actor Benicio del ToroWon
Black Reel Awards [36] Best Supporting Actor Don Cheadle Won
Blockbuster Entertainment Awards [37] Favorite Actor – Drama Michael Douglas Nominated
Favorite Supporting Actor – DramaBenicio del ToroWon
Favorite Supporting Actress – Drama Catherine Zeta-Jones Nominated
BMI Film & TV Awards Film Music Award Cliff Martinez Won
Bodil Awards Best American Film Nominated
Bogey Awards Won
Boston Society of Film Critics Awards [38] Best Director Steven Soderbergh3rd Place
British Academy Film Awards [39] Best Direction Nominated
Best Actor in a Supporting Role Benicio del ToroWon
Best Adapted Screenplay Stephen GaghanWon
Best Editing Stephen MirrioneNominated
British Society of Cinematographers [40] Best Cinematography in a Theatrical Feature FilmSteven SoderberghNominated
César Awards [41] Best Foreign Film Anthony MinghellaNominated
Chicago Film Critics Association Awards [42] Best Film Nominated
Best Director Steven SoderberghWon
Best Supporting Actor Benicio del ToroWon
Best Supporting Actress Catherine Zeta-JonesNominated
Best Screenplay Stephen GaghanNominated
Best Cinematography Steven SoderberghNominated
Chlotrudis Awards [43] Best MovieNominated
Best DirectorSteven SoderberghNominated
Best Supporting ActorBenicio del ToroWon
Best Adapted ScreenplayStephen GaghanNominated
Best CastNominated
Costume Designers Guild Awards Excellence in Contemporary Film Louise FrogleyNominated
Critics' Choice Movie Awards [44] Top 10 FilmsWon
Best Picture Nominated
Best Director Steven Soderbergh (also for Erin Brockovich )Won
Best Supporting Actor Benicio del ToroNominated
Best Adapted Screenplay Stephen GaghanWon [lower-alpha 1]
Dallas-Fort Worth Film Critics Association Awards Top 10 Films Won
Best Film Won
Best Director Steven SoderberghWon
Best Supporting Actor Benicio del ToroNominated
Best Supporting Actress Catherine Zeta-JonesNominated
Directors Guild of America Awards [45] Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Motion Pictures Steven SoderberghNominated
Edgar Allan Poe Awards [46] Best Motion Picture Stephen Gaghan (screenplay);
Simon Moore (based on the mini-series)		Won
Empire Awards Best Director Steven SoderberghNominated
Best Actor Benicio del ToroNominated
Best British Actress Catherine Zeta-JonesNominated
Film Critics Circle of Australia Awards Best Foreign FilmWon
Florida Film Critics Circle Awards [47] Best Film Won
Best Director Steven Soderbergh (also for Erin Brockovich )Won
Best Supporting Actor Benicio del ToroWon
Gold Derby Awards Best Supporting Actor of the DecadeNominated
Golden Globe Awards [48] Best Motion Picture – Drama Nominated
Best Supporting Actor – Motion Picture Benicio del ToroWon
Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture Catherine Zeta-JonesNominated
Best Director – Motion Picture Steven SoderberghNominated
Best Screenplay – Motion Picture Stephen GaghanWon
Golden Reel Awards Best Sound Editing – Dialogue & ADR, Domestic Feature Film Larry Blake and Aaron Glascock Nominated
Grammy Awards [49] Best Score Soundtrack Album for a Motion Picture, Television or Other Visual Media Cliff MartinezNominated
Humanitas Prize [50] Feature Film Stephen GaghanNominated
Imagen Awards Best Theatrical Feature FilmNominated
Kansas City Film Critics Circle Awards [51] Best FilmWon
Best DirectorSteven SoderberghWon
Best Supporting ActorBenicio del ToroWon
Kinema Junpo Awards Best Foreign Language FilmSteven SoderberghWon
Best Foreign Language Film DirectorWon
Las Vegas Film Critics Society Awards [52] Best DirectorSteven Soderbergh (also for Erin Brockovich )Won
Best ActorMichael DouglasNominated
Best Supporting ActorBenicio del ToroWon
Best Original ScreenplayStephen GaghanNominated
Best Film EditingStephen MirrioneNominated
Los Angeles Film Critics Association Awards [53] Best Director Steven Soderbergh (also for Erin Brockovich )Won
Best Supporting Actor Benicio del ToroRunner-up
Best Cinematography Steven SoderberghRunner-up
Manaki Brothers Film Festival Golden Camera 300Nominated
MTV Movie Awards Breakthrough Female Performance Erika Christensen Won
Nastro d'Argento Best Foreign DirectorSteven SoderberghNominated
National Board of Review Awards [54] Top Ten Films 2nd Place
Best Director Steven Soderbergh (also for Erin Brockovich )Won
National Festival of Dubbing Voices in the ShadowBest Overall DubbingNominated
National Society of Film Critics Awards [55] Best Film 2nd Place
Best Director Steven Soderbergh (also for Erin Brockovich )Won
Best Supporting Actor Benicio Del ToroWon
Best Screenplay Stephen Gaghan3rd Place
Best Cinematography Steven Soderbergh3rd Place
New York Film Critics Circle Awards [56] [57] Best Film Won
Best Director Steven Soderbergh (also for Erin Brockovich )Won
Best Actor Benicio del ToroRunner-up
Best Supporting Actor Won
Online Film & Television Association Awards [58] Best PictureMarshall Herskovitz, Edward Zwick and Laura BickfordWon
Best DirectorSteven SoderberghNominated
Best Supporting ActorBenicio del ToroNominated
Best Youth PerformanceErika ChristensenNominated
Best Adapted ScreenplayStephen GaghanNominated
Best CastingDebra ZaneWon
Best CinematographySteven SoderberghNominated
Best Film EditingStephen MirrioneNominated
Best SoundNominated
Best EnsembleWon
Best Titles SequenceNominated
Best Official Film WebsiteNominated
Online Film Critics Society Awards [59] Top 10 Films5th Place
Best Picture Nominated
Best Director Steven SoderberghNominated
Best Supporting Actor Benicio del ToroWon [lower-alpha 2]
Best Screenplay Stephen GaghanNominated
Best Cinematography Steven SoderberghNominated
Best Editing Stephen MirrioneNominated
Best Ensemble Nominated
Phoenix Film Critics Society AwardsBest PictureNominated
Best DirectorSteven SoderberghWon
Best Actor in a Supporting RoleBenicio del ToroNominated
Best Adapted ScreenplayStephen GaghanNominated
Best CinematographySteven SoderberghNominated
Best Film EditingStephen MirrioneNominated
Political Film Society Awards Exposé Nominated
Prism Awards Theatrical Feature FilmWon
San Diego Film Critics Society Awards Best Supporting Actor Benicio del ToroWon
Satellite Awards [60] Best Motion Picture – Drama Won
Best Director Steven SoderberghWon
Best Supporting Actor in a Motion Picture – Drama Benicio del ToroNominated
Best Adapted Screenplay Stephen GaghanNominated
Best Art Direction Keith P. CunninghamNominated
Best Cinematography Steven SoderberghNominated
Best Editing Stephen MirrioneNominated
Best Original Score Cliff MartinezNominated
Outstanding Motion Picture Ensemble Won
Saturn Awards [61] Best Action/Adventure/Thriller Film Nominated
Screen Actors Guild Awards [62] Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture Benjamin Bratt, James Brolin, Don Cheadle, Erika Christensen,
Clifton Collins Jr., Benicio del Toro, Michael Douglas, Albert Finney,
Topher Grace, Amy Irving, Dennis Quaid and Catherine Zeta-Jones		Won
Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Leading Role Benicio del ToroWon
Southeastern Film Critics Association Awards [63] Best Picture2nd Place
Best DirectorSteven SoderberghWon
Best Supporting ActorBenicio del ToroWon
Best Adapted ScreenplayStephen GaghanWon
Teen Choice Awards Choice Movie BreakoutErika ChristensenNominated
Toronto Film Critics Association Awards [64] Best Film Runner-up
Best Director Steven SoderberghWon
Best Male Performance Benicio Del ToroWon
Turkish Film Critics Association Awards Best Foreign Film2nd Place
Vancouver Film Critics Circle Awards [65] Best Film Won
Best Director Steven SoderberghWon
Best Actor Benicio Del ToroWon
Village Voice Film Poll [66] Best Supporting PerformanceWon
Writers Guild of America Awards [67] Best Screenplay – Based on Material Previously Produced or Published Stephen GaghanWon
Young Hollywood Awards Breakthrough Male PerformanceTopher GraceWon
Standout Female PerformanceErika ChristensenWon

Top ten lists

Traffic appeared on several critics' top ten lists for 2000. Some of the notable top-ten list appearances are: [68]

See also

Notes

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References

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  4. ↑ Dargis, Manohla. "Traffic: Border Wars". The Criterion Collection.
  5. ↑ Cason, Jim; David Brooks (2001-03-09). "Traffic, película que podría ser la crítica más severa a la lucha antidrogas de EU". La Jornada (in Spanish). Archived from the original on 2011-05-26. Retrieved 2009-02-25.
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  7. ↑ Shaw, Deborah (2005). ""You Are Alright, But...": Individual and Collective Representations of Mexicans, Latinos, Anglo-Americans and African-Americans in Steven Soderbergh's 'Traffic'". Quarterly Review of Film and Video . 22: 211–223. doi:10.1080/10509200490474339. S2CID   190712388. Archived from the original on 2011-07-22. Retrieved 2009-02-25.
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