"You're coming off heroin. If you think you are any match for me, then you are mistaken. I do not lose." - Bill Paterson as Jack Lithgow
Traffik DVD Review
By Jonathan Boudreaux
Traffik, a 1989 British miniseries that ran in the U.S. on Masterpiece Theater, is an unflinching look at heroin - from the growth of poppy seeds by poor Pakistani farmers to trafficking through Hamburg to its use by strung out Brits. It also served as the basis for Steven Soderbergh's 2000 film Traffic. Although the miniseries and the film share a basic structure and general plotline, their fundamental differences make the miniseries well worth a look in its own right.
Bill Paterson (The Singing Detective) plays Jack Lithgow, a British Home Office Minister who serves as the head of the drug abuse committee. As the miniseries begins, he is in Pakistan on a mission to determine whether aid awarded by the British government in the past has been put to good use and should therefore be renewed. This program, called the "Crop Replacement Scheme," is meant to pay poor Pakistani farmers to stop growing poppies, the basis of morphine and heroin, and instead grow sugar or other food crops.
Pakistani officials have good reason to want the aid to continue, especially since they skim as much as 25% of the money for themselves. They make a show of providing evidence that the program is a success, but the fact is that it has failed miserably. For every five acres of poppies, farmers must grow twenty acres of cane to earn the same amount of money. Unfortunately for the Brits, poppies grow like weeds, needing very little care in Pakistan's normally inhospitable soil.
The farmers, like Fazal (Jamal Shah), do not grow poppies to get rich. They simply have no choice: either they can extract opium from the plants and sell it to heroin makers, or their families will starve. And while the Pakistan officials cut down on farming, they continue to let the drug trade flourish, thus punishing only the lowest people in the chain.
Meanwhile, in Hamburg, two cops, Dieter (Tilo Pruckner) and Ulli (Fritz Muller-Scherz) nab drug carrier Ledesert (Peter Lakenmacher) in a bust. When he is discovered with 70 kilos of heroin, the detectives cut a deal with him in order to bring down his drug trafficking superiors. They are somewhat shocked to learn that the ringleader is none other than Karl Rosshalde (George Kukura), a model citizen whose construction company has just built and continues to run a vital water-pumping station in Pakistan. When Rosshalde is arrested, his British born wife Helen (Lindsay Duncan) is at first shocked by the accusations. When it becomes apparent that her financial well being and her personal safety are in peril, however, she makes plans to restart her husband's drug imports.
Back home in Britain, Lithgow tells his committee of the importance of renewing the Pakistani aid so as to perpetuate the belief that drugs are primarily an "overseas problem." As he soon discovers, the problem has actually hit closer to home - his daughter, Caroline (Julia Ormond) is hooked on heroin. He believes that he can end her problem through sheer force of will, but to his dismay, the drug's influence is stronger than his. Caroline's downward spiral includes stealing from her dying grandfather, burgling a pharmacy, injecting heroin into her feet in a public toilet, and, finally, prostituting herself. Her self-destruction helps Lithgow to better understand the drug problem his country faces, and forces him to make some hard decisions as to what Britain's best course of action would be.
The most compelling of Traffik's storylines, incidentally, is the one that was cut from the movie remake - poppy farmer Fazal's desperate struggle to survive and to provide for his family. When his crop is burned by government officials and his hand is crippled by a gunshot, he travels to Karachi to look for work. When honest work fails to surface, he turns to Tariq Butt (Talat Hussain), a rich transportation baron who uses his business as a front for drug trafficking. Butt, who chastises his son for insulting Islam by drinking alcohol, has no qualms supplying the world with a much stronger substance, and he is perfectly willing to kill or torture anyone who stands in his way. Fazal recognizes that he is working for an evil man, but feels that he must continue to do so in order to support his family. The miniseries gives a human face to growers like Fazal, refusing to simply label them "bad."
Still, it does not shy away from the brutality and horror of the drug trade. This is especially true in the constant use of children in peril. At least four of the six episodes present young children used as human shields, collateral, or, in one horrible incident, as a source of punishment for a father's misdeeds. Another scene features a toddler playing with a junkie's spent needle.
This set does have one major flaw. The story alternates between Pakistan, Germany, and Britain. At various times, the characters either speak English or whatever their native language happens to be. This adds to the believability of the miniseries and helps to differentiate between the different locales. When the dialogue is not in English, clearly legible subtitles appear onscreen. The first episode, however, has been replaced by a dubbed version. This is rather unusual and annoying, but at least the remaining episodes are included in their original form.
The six episodes that comprise this miniseries are divided onto two discs. The menus are simple and easy to navigate. There is no play all feature. Each episode is divided into five chapters. When accessing the episodes through the scene selection menu, the opening credits are skipped.
