The second half of Soderbergh's unbelievable year 2000 was TRAFFIC, his sprawling adaptation of the 1989 Channel 4 miniseries about the many sides of the drug trade. At the time, it was hailed as a highly nuanced and humane look at narcotics. But how does it look from 2025? Joining us to discuss is professor and author of our much-cited Quick Fixes: Drugs in America from Prohibition to the 21st Century Binge, Benjamin Y. Fong! We talk macroeconomics, "Mexico filter," drug movies, Benicio Del Toro's accent, and a whole lot more. Really fascinating episode, we hope you enjoy!

Further Reading:

Quick Fixes: Drugs in America from Prohibition to the 21st Century Binge by Benjamin Y. Fong

Rebels on the Backlot by Sharon Waxman

In Search of Respect: Selling Crack in El Barrio by Philippe Bourgois

Steven Soderbergh: Interviews, ed. Anthony Kaufman

Further Viewing:

"No, Mexico isn't actually that orange. Hollywood is just racist." from Mashable

MIKEY AND NICKY (May, 1976)

TRAFFIK (Reid, 1989)

HIGHWAY PATROLMAN (Cox, 1991)

LEAVING LAS VEGAS (Figgis, 1995)

ENTER THE VOID (Noe, 2009)

THE HOUSE I LIVE IN (Jarecki, 2012)

THE SPECTACULAR NOW (Ponsoldt, 2013)

EMBRACE OF THE SERPENT (Guerra, 2015)

MONOS (Landes, 2019)

BLOODY NOSE, EMPTY POCKETS (Ross brothers, 2020)

Follow Benjamin Y. Fong:

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This is a preview of a premium episode from our Patreon feed, Paid Costly For Me! Head over to Patreon.com/PodCastyForMe to hear more for just $5 a month.

In the aftermath of DIRTY HARRY, there were plenty of films looking to get in on the semi-legal vigilante craze. One of the most successful of these was Phil Karlson's WALKING TALL, starring the great, recently departed Joe Don Baker as real-life Tennessee lawman Buford Pusser, who was all too willing to tell the world how he beat the corruption out of McNairy County with a fencepost. Except that he was kind of full of hot air, and the whole thing is - at least for Ian - one of the most nakedly fascist films we've ever watched for the show! This episode was a long time coming, so we hope you enjoy.

Thanks as always to Jetski for our theme music and Jeremy Allison for our artwork.

Community Justice Exchange's Directory of Immigration System Bail Funds

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Soderbergh finally hit a box-office home run in 2000 with ERIN BROCKOVICH, a Julia Roberts-starring biopic about a paralegal with a big personality and a nose for corporate environmental malfeasance, and the one-two punch of BROCKOVICH and TRAFFIC in a single year cemented him as a truly major filmmaker. This is one of the big ones, so we brought in our friend Carlee from Hit Factory to talk about basically everything: capitalism, the climate, gender, fashion, interpassivity, Todd Haynes, and Sheryl Crow. Great ep! Don't use ChatGPT even as a joke!

Further Reading:

Superman's Not Coming by Erin Brockovich

"Digging For The Truth" by Robert B. Welkos

"Ordinary Heroes vs. Failed Lawyers: Public Interest Litigation in 'Erin Brockovich' and Other Contemporary Films" by Michael McCann and William Haltom

"Erin Brockovich, 20 Years Later: 'I See So Many of Us Finding That Courage to Stand Up'" by Susan King

Further Viewing:

A CIVIL ACTION (Zaillian, 1998)

LEGALLY BLONDE (Luketic, 2001)

FIRST REFORMED (Schrader, 2017)

DARK WATERS (Haynes, 2019)

EVIL DOES NOT EXIST (Hamaguchi, 2023)

Follow Carlee:

https://x.com/deepimpactcrier

https://x.com/HitFactoryPod

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Support us on Patreon:

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Artwork by Jeremy Allison:

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