Blow

By Blake French:

I don't think George Jung was a corrupt, sleazy drug smuggler, but, more or less, a young businessman making money to support his family and wild lifestyle. That is what makes Ted Demme's "Blow" different from other drug movies-it does not portray its characters as addicted lowlifes, but as recklessly successful, high powered individuals who simply want to live the American dream. The film is based on the true story of George Jung, whose image went from the average Joe next door, a high-school football star from a small Massachusetts town, to the world's premiere importer of cocaine from Colombia's Medellin cartel, who once supplied the States with over 85% of the total amount of imported cocaine in the 1970's and 80's. "Blow" is one of the best movies of the year.

"Blow" covers a wide range of generations and locations, ranging from the turbulent 60's to the haze of the 80's, and from such areas of the North America like Massachusetts, Florida, Colombia, California, Mexico, New York and Illinois. The time and location span provided the filmmakers with a challenge. The film was shot in a variety of locations in Southern California and in Mexico. "It was a difficult film to schedule and shoot because it had so many different time periods. And since it was the story of a man's life, every scene was fairly brief which meant an incredible number of scenes to be shot," explains executive producer Georgia Kacandes.

Covering so many years in a single film also tests the ability of the film's costume designers and makeup artists. The wardrobes, makeup and hair styles appear authentic and impressive. This movie pays close attention to even some of the most minute of details.

George Jung's motives for pursuing drugs may have been triggered by his family life as a child. His father was a nobody construction worker who often struggled with money and his marriage. In the film, Ray Liotta plays George's poor but content father, with the versatile Rachel Griffiths as his bitter, unhappy mother. George vows to never live his life in poverty, no matter what.

He moves to California as a young adult where selling marijuana supports his independent lifestyle. Paul Reubens and Ethan Suplee play George's drug-dealing comrades. Eventually, the authorities send him to prison for a while, where he meets Diego Delgado (Jordi Molla). An insider in Colombia's rising drug trade, this man educates George about the profits of selling cocaine. After serving his time, Jung becomes partners with Pablo Escobar (Cliff Curtis), the billionaire godfather of international cocaine trafficking.

"Blow" displays a consistent and detailed portrait of the spectacular rise, and dramatic fall, of Jung and his travel towards turning powder cocaine into American's biggest drug problem. Ted Demme's direction is vivid, determined, and stylish. He reportedly conducted many interviews with the real life George Jung, as he makes very clear the early high life, and the dangerous reality of a drug smuggler's everyday lifestyle. Demme is careful to stay away from frequent potential distractions, like the drug use, side characters, family issues, and romantic interests. This is a vivid narrative of a very interesting character. It does display a message about drugs that we have seen before, but never in this stylishly innovative light.

Laced with amusing detail and probing awareness, "Blow" defies the usual road of drug movies and provides us with tension and interest from Jung's many experiences-risky border crossings, ferocious consultation, unexpected deception, the persistence of the authorities, and unconquerable temptations. But untimely the film shows the true tragedy of losing your dreams to greed and drugs.

Johnny Depp proves once again what a triumphant, adaptable actor he can be. He portrays George Jung with the perfect amount of greed, style, confusion, pride, and desperation. The real George Jung is in a prison cell in New York. Without possibility of parole, Jung's release date is scheduled for 2015. Depp acknowledged the responsibility that comes with dramatizing a true individual, but also the responsibility of the director. "I knew Ted was committed to the film, but I didn't understand how deeply committed he was to the real George."

"Blow" becomes one of the most intriguing movies of 2001, but it even suffers in comparison to the incomprehensible achievement director Darren Aronofsky accomplished last year with his disturbingly real display of the downward spiral of four drug addicts in "Requiem for a Dream." That film gave us a cinematic taste of what drug addicts experience through their addictions and depravity. "Blow" still shines a fresh new light on drugs in movies, and perceptively portrays the story of a person from whom many can learn. 

American Gangster

I've been hearing that American Gangster is just your run-of-the-mill cop vs. robber flick, again showing Ridley Scott's prevailing mediocrity. Hey, I love the cast and I find Scott almost as intriguing as his brother, so I was all for it. Generic gangsters with Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe should still be better than most. However, while finding it to be unoriginal, I didn't see it as a crime film. Instead it was one of my least favorite genres, the biopic. We are shown Frank Lucas go from driver of Harlem's bigshot to king of the drug world and Richie Roberts from beat cop/law student to drug investigator head/prosecuting lawyer. Rather than give us all conflict, we get sequence after sequence of how these two got where they get. Not only that, but I couldn't tell you at the end who was the good guy and who the bad. Both men are glorified and shown to have enemies that they vault over because of character, whether moral or not. They both beat the odds, and honestly, I liked Denzel's Lucas as a person more than Crowe's Roberts.

There is just too much going on here. How many times do we need to see Robert's boyscout mentality and Lucas' calm demeanor and non-flashy appearance? Both men do what they should to be successful in their field, only while Crowe continuously gets punished for it in life—but not career per se—Washington just gets richer. Who should we strive to be then? Like the young man with a 95 mph fastball, who gives up his gravy train, says, "I want to be like you Uncle Frank." You don't see Robert's son looking up to dad, instead he seems to not even know he exists, pretty much because he doesn't to him.

I don't want to slight the story though. This is a very intriguing premise, how a black man subverts the middleman, like local electronic stores, to buy his drugs from the source in Bangkok. This no name does what the Italians never could, sell superior product for half the price, and stay almost completely under the radar. Whether the expensive chinchilla coat from his wife truly was the cause of him appearing on enemy lists or not—it is a bit convenient—it was bound to happen sometime. Although, keeping a low profile and staying conservative is a novel idea that you'd think more criminals would want to adopt. The Frank Lucas story works, but I think it would truly succeed as its own tale. Just show us his life, or maybe just his heyday as a ruthless criminal, not as a kid from the streets that works hard and runs his city. Glorifying crime should not be what Hollywood wants to do.

While the Lucas tale was good, the Roberts one was great. Now, the Richie Roberts Story is something I would definitely watch. Here is a guy that is married to his job and estranged from his wife and kid. Someone who finds a million dollars of drug money and doesn't take a penny; will not cover for his partner or friends if they do something illegal; and who will stop at nothing to actually put bad men behind bars. Even more unbelievable is how he not only takes down the most dangerous criminal in New York, but he also prosecutes him in court, getting him to cooperate in taking down corrupt cops. Then, the craziest revelation of all, he becomes Lucas' defense attorney and gets his term shortened by fifty years. It is too bad that rather than give two hour-and-a-half films on each guy separately, we get a bloated three hour parallel tale of the two at once. I only stayed invested in anticipation to finally see these two powerhouses on screen together.

In that regard, Washington and Crowe deliver the goods like usual. Supporting them, however, is a big time cast of names. I can't believe all the people they got to be involved here with bit parts. Ejiofor, Hawkes, Brolin, Gugino, Common, Ortiz, Gooding Jr., Assante, and more vault the story to a higher level through their professionalism. Even RZA has a nice turn, but did we need the money shot of his tattooed name on his shoulder? Come on, cover that up, it was just stupid. I really hope John Ortiz will continue to get work because like in Miami Vice, he makes a small role his own.

So, in the end, as with most biopics, this one just shows too much. It lulled me into a sense of cruise control, just watching and watching, waiting for something special to happen. There are moments, like the final shootout that works nicely and a good exchange at the end between Lucas and his mother, but they are few and very far between. Only in America can a man without conscience, a murderer and drug-lord, blow-in a few corrupt cops and skate out of jail time to once again roam the streets. I understand the utilitarianism of it all and that he might be a marked man now, but honestly, he turned in police officers not gang leaders. There won't be any hits put on his head; he'll be able to retire with no problem. Not to mention, I'm sure, that probably no ramifications were experienced by the military and their involvement in the smuggling of contraband into the country. It's like this all happened and we learned nothing from it.

Sweet Sixteen

"Sweet Sixteen" was a very pleasant surprise. For someone like me who have yet been exposed to his previous works before this, I shall now eagerly go out and seek out his other movies.
The gradual dramatic shift and character build-up in Sweet Sixteen is a testament to Ken Loach's artistry and masterful craft as a director. His empathy for his characters is very evident here. Coupled with his intuitive understanding of how this story should be told, the film packed an emotional wallop (especially approaching the end) much unexpected before watching it.
Particularly striking is the unexpected range of Martin Compston's portrayal of Liam, the male protagonist of this powerful film. Throughout the film, we glimpsed into the psyche of this young boy/ man - his intelligence (uncanny street smarts), his honour (towards friendship & kinship), his courage and conviction and most heartbreakingly, his idealistic naiveté. This boy is brimming with charismatic magnetism. A bright future awaits him (can already picture him as a future Clive Owen or Tim Roth).
The scene that sold me was the (mild spoilers ahead) unexpectedly moving confrontation between Liam and his friend Pinball(approaching the end of the film). In those short few minutes, the power and depths of their ties were presented with heartbreaking clarity. I was floored completely. Being the sensitive bloke that I am, I welled up on witnessing the heartfelt sincerity of that scene. Unbelievable.
Beneath Sweet Sixteen's colourful language(with swearing aplenty) and thick indecipherable accents, this understated film turned out to be a very moving, top rated piece of drama. That the Oscars as usual ignored this film completely, has further cemented my disdain for the Academy's suspect taste (or lack thereof).
IMHO, Sweet Sixteen is too good a film to be ignored. It deserves a far wider audience. Will thus hope this film do secure a future commercial release in Singapore so more people can be touched by its magic. But the hopes are dim, which is very sad indeed.