Traffic
USA Films | Release Date: December 27, 2000 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
86
METASCORE
Universal acclaim based on 34 Critic Reviews
Positive:
31
Mixed:
3
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
Philadelphia InquirerSteven Rea
A flat-out electrifying experience. Read full review
100
New York Daily NewsJami Bernard
Borderline brilliant. Tackles the war on drugs from a kaleidoscope of perspectives. Read full review
100
Entertainment WeeklyOwen Gleiberman
The rare Hollywood epic that dares to entertain an audience by engaging the world. Read full review
100
SalonJeff Stark
In the scorching new film Traffic, director Steven Soderbergh captures the hypocrisy -- and tragedy -- of the nation's unwinnable war on drugs. Traffic is a huge, determined movie in every way. Read full review
100
Seattle Post-IntelligencerSean Axmaker
There's not a smarter, more demanding American film from the past year. Read full review
100
Portland OregonianShawn Levy
A stunning film. Read full review
100
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
Soderbergh's story, from a screenplay by Stephen Gaghan, cuts between these characters so smoothly that even a fairly complex scenario remains clear and charged with tension. Read full review
100
Chicago TribuneMichael Wilmington
It's a thriller that really thrills, a drama that really engages, a portrait of a world and system out of joint that is painfully convincing and totally engrossing from the first simmering minute to the last explosive second. Read full review
100
San Francisco ChronicleEdward Guthmann
Explosive entertainment, with the tension and volatility of its subject matter. Read full review
100
VarietyTodd McCarthy
Enormously ambitious and masterfully made, Traffic represents docudrama-style storytelling at a very high level. Read full review
100
Dallas ObserverRobert Wilonsky
It is a remarkable achievement in filmmaking, a beautiful and brutal work. Read full review
94
Mr. ShowbizKevin Maynard
Traffic is a riveting, semi-documentary drama, and yet calling it that is a disservice to just how suspenseful and stylish an entertainment it is. Read full review
90
Village VoiceJ. Hoberman
Traffic is not just an ultra-procedural--it's the Big Picture, the Whole Enchilada, complete with a complicated war between two Mexican drug cartels. Read full review
90
Film.comRobert Horton
Movie excitement from beginning to end. Read full review
90
Washington PostDesson Thomson
Sinfully watchable ensemble movie. Read full review
90
NewsweekDavid Ansen
Traffic doesn’t quite come to a full emotional boil at the end. Soderbergh is too knowing to offer easy solutions. But what a journey it takes us on: disturbing, exciting, completely absorbing. Read full review
90
Film.comErnest Hardy
One of the things that makes Traffic so very good is the wry humor that's laced throughout the film. It's a funny movie. Read full review
90
The New York TimesStephen Holden
May be the first Hollywood movie since Robert Altman's "Nashville" to infuse epic cinematic form with jittery new rhythms and a fresh, acid- washed palette. Read full review
90
L.A. WeeklyElla Taylor
His (Soderbergh's) work has taken on echoes of a classier, bygone age of cinema, at once more literate and lighthearted. Read full review
89
Austin ChronicleMarc Savlov
It's a thrilling, powerful movie, and one that certain people in certain quarters may have at one time called dangerous. Some of them may yet still. Read full review
88
Charlotte ObserverLawrence Toppman
He's (Soderbergh) among the few directors working today who makes me wonder what he'll do next - and draws me into the movie house, whatever it may be. Read full review
88
Boston GlobeJay Carr
It's the best drug-busting movie since ''The French Connection.'' Read full review
88
New York PostJonathan Foreman
Atriumph on almost every level. It is breathtakingly stylish, wonderfully acted and its three interrelated tales of the "war" on drugs are brilliantly structured to form a cohesive, powerful whole. Read full review
88
Baltimore SunChris Kaltenbach
It's every bit as thrilling and engrossing as the best spy thriller or cop flick. Read full review
75
USA TodayMike Clark
The story itself is surprisingly seamless, yet it's the individual components that linger. Read full review
75
Christian Science MonitorDavid Sterritt
The picture's thoughtfulness and ambition make it unusually suspenseful, gripping, and disturbing. Read full review
75
Miami HeraldRene Rodriguez
Where Traffic stumbles is in its inability to engage the heart with the same fervor it engages the intellect. Read full review
70
TV Guide MagazineMaitland McDonagh
Though meticulously researched, well acted and filled with striking moments, the movie ultimately feels oddly disconnected. Read full review
70
New York Magazine (Vulture)Peter Rainer
As with much of Soderbergh's avant-garde work, his garde isn't quite as avant as he would have us believe it is. Still, Soderbergh's jazzed stylistics can be smartly entertaining. Without them, an uneven movie like Traffic might seem more of a mélange than it already is. Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesKenneth Turan
So though it takes important steps in that direction, the film pulls back from what seems to be its own logical conclusion. Read full review
65
TNT RoughCutAndy Klein
It’s Del Toro who really gets to strut his stuff with a subtle, ambiguous, and riveting performance. In a field of top-notch actors, he’s the one whom you remember days later. Read full review
60
TimeRichard Schickel
Finally, though, Traffic, for all its earnestness, does not work. It leaves one feeling restless and dissatisfied. Read full review
60
Chicago ReaderJonathan Rosenbaum
I don't see this slightly better-than-average drug thriller, with slightly better-than-average direction by Steven Soderbergh, as anything more than a routine rubber-stamping of genre reflexes. Read full review
50
SlateDavid Edelstein
You could get high on this movie's technique, dizzy on its storytelling. Yet it's one of the most lucid bad trips ever made. Read full review
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