Traffic stars Michael Douglas as the newly appointed drug czar Robert Wakefield. Wakefield's challenge is to reinvigorate the drug war for the president. In a private meeting with the departing drug czar, a former army general, Wakefield is taken aback by the general's lament that years of effort have had no impact on the drug trade.
Traffic also takes the audience on a chilling journey into drug law enforcement in Mexico.
We witness high level corruption from the perspective of an ordinary Mexican police officer. No one, because it becomes painfully clear that this man must work day in and day out in an environment where the line between cops and robbers has been completely erased. Sadly, that episode and other suspenseful scenes from Tijuana don't come from the imagination of Hollywood writers. This film is reality-based. The enormous profits generated by the black market have given gangster organizations so much wealth they have compromised the integrity of Latin American law enforcement institutions.