A masterpiece that exposes the whole story of drug trafficking presented by the genius of ``Traffic'' Soderbergh. What makes it complicated but not difficult?

Chaotic visuals that make it difficult to even distinguish the actors' faces

What's amazing about Soderbergh is that he has used this color coding to pursue artistic possibilities. The images are abstracted to an extreme, with the "blue" and "yellow" parts almost looking like a black-and-white film. The lack of focus and camera shake makes it difficult for the audience to grasp all the characters. One could say that Traffic sacrifices clarity in favor of style.

Even though a big star like Michael Douglas appears in the film, it is quite rare in Hollywood to "not know the faces of the actors very well." Even though it was produced and distributed by an independent studio called USA Films, it is amazing that Soderbergh's aggressive attitude was tolerated in a movie of the scale of "Traffic."

Why was Soderbergh able to stick to such a selfish request? The biggest reason is that Soderbergh was not only the director but also the director of photography. Some people may ask, "But in the staff credits, isn't the director of photography a man named Peter Andrews?" To explain, Peter Andrews is a pseudonym for Soderbergh.

The position of director of photography is the person in charge of overseeing the visual aspects as the director's right-hand man. In Japan, photography and lighting are often separate, but the director of photography is in charge of controlling everything that appears on the screen, and of course is responsible for lighting as well. For example, if the director of photography says, "Red is an eyesore and doesn't fit the film," he has the power to remove all red from the entire film.

Also, the cinematographer does not necessarily operate the camera. It is the operator who handles the camera, and the cinematographer is in charge of the camera operator. Of course, there are cinematographers who carry the camera themselves and act as the operator. And Soderbergh-Peter Andrews is the type of cinematographer who carries the camera himself.

A genius director discovered the option of “I carry the camera”