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Review: Blow
Drugs -- especially coke -- have been associated since the 60s with celebrity and glamour. To say the least, this has always sent a confusing message to the kids who are supposed to stop using them.
The Depp character predicts that once musicians start using coke, everybody else will fall in line. He was right. Actors weren't far behind. Moralists and politicians have never quite caught up to this odd American reality, the strangely glamorous cachet given drugs in this culture.
Traffic raised the question of whether our insane and costly drug policies can ever work. But that movie made sure that all its uses and peddlers were either grotesque villains or tragic victims awaiting redemption.
Blow doesn't take itself so seriously as a drug-message movie. It's more an appealing, sometimes powerful portrait of a doomed character of a particular era and environment, in which drug profits rode a tidal wave of middle-class and college-kid money.
Depp's Jung isn't a bad guy, just an oblivious one caught up in the swirl, not really in the same league as the guys he gets tangled with. He's a good-natured, good-hearted loser who rides the wave, then takes the inevitable fall. Like Traffic, this movie takes a bleak view of the government's desperate and ineffective war on drugs.
But Blow isn't really about drugs per se, at least not most of the time. It's about that strange period in American life when drugs became both celebrated and ubiquitous, even as laws and law enforcement attempts to stem the tide became more frantic, ineffective and Draconian.
The movie is based on a more-or-less real life drama (the real-life Jung's ravaged, haunted face pops up at the end, a nice move). A guy from Massachusetts heads for California, can't believe the babes and drug appetites, and ends up yakking with the celebrated Columbian druglord Pablo Escobar and shuttling truckloads of grass and cocaine in and out of the U.S. in suitcases, planes and boats. He has so much cash piled around his boat in boxes that he has to buy a new boat.
The 60s and 70s settings and styles are terrific (the soundtrack is also great, kicking off appropriately with the Rolling Stones and including Lynyrd Skynyrd and Bob Dylan). It's a perfect role for Depp, too, and he handles it easily. Ray Liotta plays Jung's doting but heartbroken father Fred, weak in the face of the money-grubbing shrew he married, who watches helplessly as his only son hits the wall. Their relationship, well portrayed, effectively sets up Jung's own sad fate.
Ultimately, Blow is a morality play about loss and betrayal, lost chances, and the unthinking ways in which people toss their lives away. Its opening shot makes clear that this is a story of reckoning, as mass-marketed movies about drugs probably have to be to get past Hollywood squeamishness and into the suburban megaplexes. (The producers said they couldn't even mention the word "drugs" in the trailers to get a "PG" rating for the preview.)
The message is always more or less the same. If you get caught up with this stuff, you will get burned badly, ultimately losing everything of value in your life, if not your life itself. It seems inevitable that the next phase will be people dealing and selling drugs (like sex) over the Net, if they aren't already.
Blow does veer off-track when Jung meets and marries a spoiled Columbian brat (Penelope Cruz) and fathers a child. Naturally, the arrival of a daughter makes Jung see the light. Is it too late to reform? (What do you think?) The relationship between Depp and Cruz never really has time to develop, though, or even make much sense, though it's critical to the film's despairing and emotional payoff. Somehow, we are not the least bit surprised when Jung's wife turns into -- you got it -- a money-grubbing shrew.
Blow is worth seeing. Despite the fact that it can't always make up its mind precisely what it's about, the movie is more than saved by Depp's heartbreaking performance. He humanizes the drug culture and makes us feel as if any of us, at that time, might easily have gotten pulled into it.
That's a bad idea. If the post office scans your packages and can't determine what's in them, they will crack them open. At best, you'll get a card back that says "You cannot send certain ILLEGAL items through the mail" (happened to a friend). At worst you could be arrested.
A couple of college students performed a study of what can be sent through the US postal service. Slashdot even linked it awhile back.
Like Traffic, this movie takes a bleak view of the government's desperate and ineffective war on drugs.
No it doesn't. It doesn't comment on the government's efforts at all. The only time the government is even portrayed is when Jung himself gets caught and put under the punishment of the law.
Columbian
When you're referring to the country of Colombia, the descriptive is 'Colombian'. I hope you don't anger too many patriotic cartels.
This movie is first and foremost a biography. It's not necessarily a commentary on the drug culture. It's not commentary on government policy. It's a biography of one man's life showing the consequences of certain decisions, not the least of which is total alienation from everything he loved. The characters are very well-portrayed (despite what Katz says, the Cruz/Depp on-screen relationship is perfect, because it accurately mirrors the Jung/Mirta relationship) and the movie moves along at a snappy enough pace that you're not left idling on any one scene.
What I didn't really like about the movie is that it never encouraged any sort of feeling about the protagonist. The movie tries at points to make you feel sorry for Jung or angry at Jung or understanding, but it never really comes through, because when he's a victim, it's really his own fault, and when he's not the taking advantage of various oppurtunities, you just see them as dumb but acceptable decisions. At the end, when I'm supposed to feel somewhat bad for this man who's lost literally everything, I don't, because everything wasn't taken away; he gave it all away. I end up feeling worse for the father than for anyone else, simply because he's the only one who constantly gets the shaft (by no fault of his own).
In all, Blow is a worthwhile movie to see, but it's not a commentary on drugs like Traffic. Depp's not going to win any Oscars for his portrayal of Jung, even though it's a relatively good one, simply because the audience really isn't all that moved. Everyone who walked out of the theatre with me basically said, "Eh, it was a good film, but I wasn't really affected by it."
YMMV.
Um, no, smugglers blues is definitely NOT the theme to Miami Vice - that had some staccato techno-synth theme.
"Too bad he has a mullet hairdo through most of the movie" - what the fuck is that supposed to mean? Everyone should have their head shaved and their eyebrows pierced these days? Fuck off you little dumbass.
Summer 2000 it was the three RAVE/Ectasy movies (Groove, etc.). Then comes Traffic, Requiem and Blow. Are drugs becoming more significant in American culture? I don't think so.
I think the new movies are capturing the drug experience better- the joy and the despair. They are less cops-and robber morality tale and more user experiences.
I don't see movies for the plot. I don't see them for the rich acting. I don't see them for the skillful handling of complex issues.
I see films because they're a cheap date that doesn't require advance planning.
But your reviews do not take this into consideration. Your reviews do not tell me whether this is a movie I should take Heidi Wall to. You seem to be under the impression that I go to movies for my own pleasure. Let me correct that impression - unless the film is playing at the "Lusty Lady Theatre", I probably won't find it terribly interesting.
I propose a simple remedy - put in a date scale. Something like this:
So Jon, can we get this scale added to your reviews? Cause once this weakness is ironed out, you will stand as the greatest film critic since Siskel.
--Shoeboy
Finally, he's on his own. He did it right. He made the movie he's wanted to make, and he did a good job with it.
Is Blow perfect? Nope, it gets into a groove and slips out of it too easily, like a faulty transmission. But it's important to note how GREAT the groove is that he carries in the 2nd act of this movie. From around the thirty minute mark up until Penelope Cruz shows up, this movie is absolute classic drug cinema (what's really scary is you could have a couple hundred movies in that catagory).
Johnny Depp, Mr. 21 Jump Street himself, proves yet again what a fantastic actor he is, and I hope he gets accolades from this performance. He IS George Jung, and the heartbreaking final act of this movie really got me.
Other truly notable performances come from one of Jung's parents, the amazing Ray Liotta, who gives the film a sense of 'Goodfellas' that the movie can't help but be compared to. A drug movie that spans a persons life, from the great times to the busts and the backstabbings. Paul Reubens also does a great job as Derek Foreal, the Californian connection.
I for one highly recommend this movie. For no other reason than to enjoy the greatness of the 2nd act and the heartbreaking finale. A few over-the-top performances (Cruz, in particular) try to weigh the movie down but Depp holds it together, along with Demme's great direction. One of the best movies to come along all year.
My rating: 7.5 out of 10
It's not like Scarface.
There are some similar elements (drugs, DEA, etc) but George is not really a bad guy. He doesn't kill anyone and doesn't want to. He's loyal to his friends and doesn't really screw people over while he gets screwed constantly by others, including the friends he defended.
Scarface *is* a bad guy. He doesn't mind screwing people, or stealing, or killing. He's a very different character.
His mom, tortures his dad, turns him in.
His wife, throws the party he gets busted at, turns him in, divorces him, takes away his daughter.
His daughter, although not as evil as the rest never forgives him, and even in her adult life is unable to forgive someone who has nothing but love for her.
After coming out of blow the message was clear, the only good woman was the dead woman.
Tony
ps: no I don't really think that, just reporting on the movie.
(If this looks familiar, it's because I already posted this on ArsTechnica last night)
What a fucking great film. Usually the high point of any movie-going experiance is to sit through the uber-cool previews, hoping in vain that the feature will live up to the excitement and emotional rush of the 2 minute ads.
That was not the case here.
I expected to get a Tomb Raider trailer, but was sorely disspointed. I did get to see a Pearl Harbor preview, but my initial excitement had an undercurrent of remorse, as I remembered not only all the men who died that day, but the fact Pearl Harbor is a love story...and it stars Ben Affleck.
So, onto the movie....
Blow begins as most great drug epics do, near the end, with a few choice words from the final chapter in the story...the much wiser...and older (damnit...Depp is one creepy fuck as a 60-something guy...the real George Jung looks like Terry Gilliam...Johnny is what I imagine Joan Rivers would look like after a nuclear war)
This movie screams Major Fucking Drug Epic from the very beginning. No question about it. You know it's going to be one sweet ride, and you are itching for it to begin like the...oh never mind.
The next 1.8 hours or so are spent following the rise and fall of Mr. George Jung and his magnificent empire in white. And green....lots of green.
"We're going to need a bigger boat."
Different hues, mind you, different hues.
The eventual fall and collapse of Jung's business and life rather than a simple footnote, we see the whole fucking thing from beginning to end. No three minute montage for us this time. The final scenes in the prision are memorable as they are heartbreaking.
Speaking of heartbreaking, I don't know what it was, but I found myself on the verge of tears during all the scenes with his daughter. This is what happens when you write real characters, not annoying or hopelessly "cute" caricatures that drag down the plot and the movie. Kudos to the man behind the keyboard...
The cast was perfect and carried the movied perfectly. Franka Pontente was a surprise...you see her in the credits but forget she exists until you realize who she is in the film. Rachel Griffiths appears, amazingly in a mother role...7 years ago she was a 20-something in Muriel's Wedding now, a 50-60 year-old mother of Johnny Depp, sporting a Massachusetts accent. That's what I call range.
Ray Liotta was brilliant...and if you thought he was only capable of being a mean, hardass character, then just wait and see this fucking movie.
Paul Rubens as a gay hairdresser? Why not?
A far cry from Pee-Wee Herman and "The Spleen". Yeah, he's pushing 50, but don't think for a minute he isn't one hell of an actor with one hell of a screen presence.
Bobcat Golthwait! Bobcat! Where the fuck have you been?!!!! Good to see you! Thanks for not bringing Pauly Shore!
To the point here...see this movie...if you have...see it again.
End Transmission
I'm willing to bet most people are unaware of the fact Blow was filmed on varying film stock.
The 60s scenes were filmed with '60s-era film
The 70s scenes were filmed with '70s-era film
etc, etc
It's a shame that no-one thought of a Katz article as an April fool joke, eg:
Review: Blow
Posted by JonKatz
I liked it.
We all know that crap is king
Give us dirty laundry!
Traffic. While the acting was fine in traffic and the stylized filmwork was interesting, I tired of it quickly. Blow was more of my kind of movie. I thought the end was a bit much, I really don't want a "please feel sorry for me" vibe forced down my throat. It should have ended about 5 minutes early, without the whole daughter/senial thing. :)
Oh...
He has so much cash piled around his boat in boxes that he has to buy a new boat.
He wasn't in a boat, he was in a rather large house, he was quoting Randel from Clerks.
"I think we need a bigger boat"
I know... Jaws.
-- Chris Martin, System Administrator
What they were doing was referencing a quote from Jaws: "You're going to need a bigger boat." The use of the quote here is obviously to tie it back to the cultural phenomenon that was Jaws.
Coming back to cultural inferences, aside from the change in clothing style, and the soundtrack transitions, there isn't a lot of period dating as would be expected through the use of selected television shows, product placement, etc.
I had a friend in High School who:
1) Started dealing a little pot in Jr. High;
2) Started dealing coke in Sr. High;
3) By the time he graduated, he had paid for a big house on the beach; with cash;
4) Had 2 new Harleys and a couple sports cars (all cash);
5) Several babes around the pool on any given weekend.
But, people get jealous. One night as he rode his Harley home from a party, a rival dealer ran him down with a big four wheel drive -- then drove over his body 8-10 times.
It's a shame, he was a really nice kid, and non-violent about the whole drug thing -- he just liked having money, respect (from his users/groupies, anyway) and a care free lifestyle.
He was 22 years old when they got him, as I recall.
Treatment, not tyranny. End the drug war and free our American POWs.
See my user info for links.
I always compare drugs with cars. Depending the person in the car, the car can be good or bad. It can serve as a transportation device or a killing device. Drugs are like that.
www.smokedot.org
(For Example, this classic scene: having a house literally filled with money neatly wrapped in plastic bundles with no place to put it.) I can see kids now, "y'know, if I could only avoid getting busted ..."
a minor nitpick is the impression that the star of the film is depicted as the first person to introduce cocaine to the US, like the US was totally virgin territory.
Check out the Vinny the Vampire comic strip
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
He doesn't even really bother with laying out the facts, but just sort of skips over it to the conclusion he likes. (I agree with him here but that's beside the point) Katz, you need to separate fact and opinion with a better wall. Oh yes, I do want to see Blow later, seems interesting.
--
--hongpong.com
Blow is based on the true story of George Jung, the man responsible for bringing cocaine into the United States and creating the market for it that still exists today. It stars Johnny Depp as Jung, and also features Paul Ruebens (formerly Pee Wee Herman) and Penelope Cruz. Jung started out dealing marijuana in California. His girlfriend was a stewardess and they used her to smuggle the dope because the airlines would never check a stewardess' bags. After a short time, he built a small empire of single engine planes and smuggling. When he got busted with over 600 pounds of pot, he ended up in jail with a cellmate who had connections with the Columbian drug lord Pablo Escobar. This connection led Jung to meeting with Escobar and that's how Escobar introduced cocaine to the U.S. in a BIG way. "Once the actors and the musicians start doing it, everyone else will catch on." This movie shows the ups and downs of this business, as Jung goes from rags to ritches to less than rags. He loses everything that he ever cared about and even more. Early on, his father tried to teach him that money is nothing compared to love. This movie is about stupidity and corruption, and someone trying to do the right thing the wrong way. Depp is wonderful, as always, as Jung. He is able to pull off humor and heartbreak at the same time. Too bad he has a mullet hairdo through most of the movie, but that's forgiveable since Blow is set in the 60's and 70's. Ray Liotta is also great as Jung's father. Penelope Cruz is really just eye candy for the guys, and her character isn't developed too well. She's a money-hungry drug dealer's girlfriend type. Unfortunately, Blow will be comapred to Traffic. Traffic is a far superior film, but I think Blow stands on it's own because it is a true story.
...All I can say is that my life is pretty strange...
Not only that, but he'd still be living like a king if he'd sheltered his money better. He had quit the business when his money was seized by the Panamanian government, and only returned to the business because he was newly broke. Some of us think we could have handled the situation a bit better, had we landed in that position...
Brackets contain world's first nanosig, highly magnified:[.]
TSIA
Brackets contain world's first nanosig, highly magnified:[.]
...to the TV series Miami Vice?
Brackets contain world's first nanosig, highly magnified:[.]
It's pointless to post so late but decency demands it - Blow is a terrible movie, inexplicably reviewed up by certain simpletons. I'm still mad about the loss of 15 dollars and two hours in my and my wife's lives. This is an entirely superficial, shaloow presentation of a boring and completely unsympathetic character. We're presented with no perceptable motivation for his actions except a childhood aversion to poverty and a rootless aversion to work. We're given no reason to believe that his dominance in the cocaine market was a result of anything besides good timing. He tells his father he's "really good" at what he does, but from what we're shown on the screen, all he does is act as a middle man and collect. The character fails to develop at all during the movie. We're told he is transformed by the birth of his daughter and subsequent drug-induced collapse, but his actions don't bear this out. He blames everyone but himself when he has face the natural consequences of his actions. Moreover, Depps performance is flat and uninspiring. Everyone is dressed real nice and immaculately coiffed, but only Penelope Cruz seems to really stretch to the point of actually giving a performance. There is no insight into the cocaine market, the criminal culture of smugglers (they do a lot of coke and there's so much money it's just SITTING AROUND - fascinating!) or what impact the coke explosion really had on society and culture. And the final hour of the movie drags and slows to an eventual snail's pace as Jung's life grinds to a predictably ignominous conclusion, leaving no moral or message other than that it's fun to make a ton of money without really working, but it sucks to get beat up and thrown in jail. Style triumphs over substance once again.
It Is the Nature of Information to Transgress Artificial Boundaries
Possible Spoilers Ahead
I saw this movie on Friday and also thought it was a pretty good flic. Even though it made the the drug selling culture look exciting and fun at times (ie. buying a house in the Carribean), it did not forget to remind you that you were dealing with crazy criminals(ie. when the Pablo character asks the pilot for pictures of his kids and where they go to school.)
To me the movie came down to a final question of was it worth it? Was it worth it to spend a mojority of your life lonely and broke for ~10 years of living like a king? The movie obviously says no, but it the question that I have been wrestling with since I saw it on Friday.
10. It said it was based on a true story and then substantially diverged with the true elements of that story. The Last half of the movie is almost completely fiction.(read the book).
9. Those montage scenes. Yes, we can definitely tell that Ted Demme used to direct a lot of music videos.
8. Johny Depp. Just like in "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas," Depp showed he is just a pretty face with no range as an actor.
7. The story told without showing. In the beginning, when they were looking for pot in Mexico, and they had an (ugh!!!) montage scene of people playing around at the pool. Then Johny Dipshit voices over with "We worked hard and we played hard." We'll have to take his word for it, because the film made it look like Spring Break on Padre Island.
6. No good, raunchy sex scenes. Drugs are good because they help guys get laid. Sad but true. There was no good sex in the movie. Pretty tame for a movie called blow. That's the whole point of drug use, to get laid. Oh sure, Jung wasn't getting all the poontang he could from coked-up starlets. He was a decent family man. Ha!
5. Building Sympathy for George Jung. Jung was no victim. He eventually got caught at the height of his career and enthusiastically cooperated with the Feds to entrap his former colleagues. In his book he was unrepentant.
4. The friggin' daughter subplot. Drug Daddy Knows Best? What is this crap?
3. It's two hours long! If a movie is bad, like this one is, making it longer just prolongs the agony. Anyone notice that Woody Allen's best early movies are about one and a half hours long?
2. Blow? Blow me! Sorry, I just had to say it.
And the number one reason Blow blew is...
...drum roll...
Jon Katz's review! And a hearty bronx cheer for all the moderating morons who took off the points of the replies that complained that such a contemptibly uninformed and uninspired piece ever got featured, especially for such an unimportant movie.
Excelsior,
ME
evanchik.net