THE INFILTRATOR – Rated R

THE INFILTRATOR – Rated R

Starring Bryan Cranston, Diane Kruger, John Leguizamo, Benjamin Bratt and Olympia Dukakis

Based on the book by the same name and written by US Customs Official Robert Mazur about his own life (Mazur also serves as Executive Producer on this film) we venture into the world of money laundering and the drug cartel ~ This is THE INFILTRATOR!

With his career winding down after being injured on the job, thus giving him the opportunity for early retirement, US Customs Official Robert Mazur (Bryan Cranston) decides he wants to take on one more case…before he rides off into the sunset in the midst of our countries War on Drugs.

When fellow official/undercover agent Emir Abreu (John Leguizamo) manages to get deep into the underground of the drug cartel, befriending those in charge, he decides that Mazur has to join him for just one more joy ride before he goes…

As Mazur and Abreu manage to infiltrate the cartel, Mazur concludes that the only way to finally bring down these thugs for good, is to hit them where it hurts, so he produces a money-laundering scheme hoping they will all buy in…thus producing enough evidence to even take them all down, including the king pin himself, Pablo Escobar…

I give THE INFILTRATOR a rating between MUST SEE ON THE BIG SCREEN and WAIT AND CATCH THIS ONE ON DVD: Cranston is fabulous playing US Customs Official turned undercover money launderer Mazur – as much as I enjoyed seeing him in TRUMBO last year, I think his performance this time around is even better…and Leguizamo is perfectly cast too as the undercover informant who gets too close to the bad guys for his own good. Kruger is also fabulous playing Mazur’s planted fiancé for their little charade as well. So why the in-between rating? Even though all the casting was perfect, including the return of Benjamin Bratt in action as drug lord Roberto Alcaino, I found that the fact that we couldn’t read the subtext during all the Spanish speaking scenes took away from the film (hoping that was just the theater, and not the way the film was produced) and the fact that we didn’t get too deep into the life of the king Pin himself, Pablo Escobar, left me feeling like something was missing when it was all said and done. And even with all of the good performances and the action-packed scenes throughout, some of the other scenes in this film, played out way too slow for me. But I also must share that my 16 year old daughter who joined me to see it said that “besides all the blood and guts Mom, I think that film was really good, so there you have it…even though I wasn’t totally sold on THE INFILTRATOR as a definite MUST SEE ON THE BIG SCREEN for me, besides the graphic scenes, my daughter enjoyed viewing it, which I wasn’t expecting at all either.

Kathy Kaiser