The story about America's biggest drug-lord

Rating: 7/10 (9 November 2004)

Ted Demme's "Blow" is the true, epic story about George Junge. Probably the biggest and most powerful drug-lord America has ever seen. 80% of the cocaine that people bought in 70's and the 80's came from George Junge...according to himself. Junge has taken part in the process of making a film out of his life, and even though it is a highly watchable film, it is not as good as I (and many others) hoped a film like this would be.
George Junge (played by Johnny Depp) grew up in Massachusets. His family was poor and his parents were arguing a lot. When he got older he moved to California with his friend Tuna (played by Ethan Suplee). In the 1960's, marihuana was flourishing on the beaches in the sunshine-state, and it didn't take long before George and Tuna started to sell marihuana for a living. But George found out later that smuggling the mariuhana was going to make him more money. The smuggling is very successful until he gets caught and ends up in jail. In jail he meets Diego (played by Jordi Molla) who convinces him that cocaine is the definite key to success. This is when the story of history's biggest drug-lord really starts.
When I read the plot for the first time, I hoped this would be a quality-film to place 'up there' with crime-classics like "Scarface" (1983) and "GoodFellas" (1990). I mite have been expecting too much when comparing it too such masterpieces, but the film did turn out to be a quality-film, yet far from a masterpiece.
Right from the beginning of, "Blow" overwhelms the viewer with a way of story-telling that's heavily inspired and almost totally ripped off of Martin Scorsese's already mentioned "GoodFellas"...only it's done much better in the latter. During parts of the film it looks good, but I mostly got the feeling of "haven't I seen this in a much better way, before?". But that's not the films most notable weakness...I think that's the running-time. During the first half-hour, the film rushes through long parts of George Junge's life, and it's not until George escapes from prison and decides to visit his parents that I feel we get the first scenes of the film, with good dialogs and character-portrayal. Scenes with involving dialogs is something that's absent through out long parts of the film. This is a true story with much to offer, so a running time of at least 30 minutes longer would have been nothing but positive for the film.
When it comes to the acting, there's not much to complain about. Johnny Depp is the main attraction in his totally convincing role as George Jung. This is a very hard and risky role to play, but Depp is doing great. Other than him, I think Ray Liotta and Rachel Griffiths in their roles as George's parents, are the most impressive. Other roles that's worth mentioning is Paul Reubens (Derek), Jordi Molla (Diego) and Cliff Curtis' performance as the Columbian cocaine-king Pablo Escobar.
"Blow" is a highly watchable and entertaining film with a good story to tell, and Johnny Depp's acting is enough reason to 'have a watch'. But it's far from original, and it could've been done much better in many ways. So over all...this is a good crime-movie with clearly weaknesses and down-sides.
7.0 out of 10