In the movie Traffic, a rich girl from Cincinnati's Indian Hill neighborhood gets hooked on cocaine and heroin.

        She is beautiful, blond and accomplished — third in her class at Cincinnati Country Day School, the movie tells us. She is done in, it would seem, by too much privilege.

        In several harrowing scenes, the girl is overcome with bliss as she freebases cocaine. Her head lolls, her skin turns sweaty, her eyes glaze over. She hardly notices a man having sex with her.

        I hope this is just Hollywood fiction. I wish I could be as certain as the leader of the real Cincinnati Country Day School.

'Bogus,' he says

        “Everything you see in the movie as it relates to the school is bogus,” said Headmaster Charles Clark.

        Teen-agers from Country Day, where the annual tuition is $13,090, are not any more prone to drug use than kids anywhere, he says. They certainly don't do cocaine or descend into prostitution, as the character in the movie does, he says.

        “This served Hollywood well. This did not serve our society — Cincinnati — and it did not serve Country Day School well,” Mr. Clark said.

        On Wednesday night, he attended the local premiere of Traffic, which opens to the public today.

        Here's how Cincinnati comes up. After she and her friends are caught dumping a drug-addled pal in front of a hospital, the rich girl is arrested. A social worker asks where she goes to school.

        “Cincinnati Country Day,” she says with faint scorn, as if mocking the school's lofty reputation.

        Then there are two mentions of Indian Hill, the exclusive neighborhood where the school is located. Several houses in Indian Hill as well as one in Hyde Park were used in the filming.

        Early on, the words “Indian Hill” and “Cincinnati” scroll across the screen to identify where some of the characters live. And toward the end, a smart young man from the day school talks economics with Michael Douglas' character.

        If black kids drove through Indian Hill seeking drugs, their demand would create a supply, the teen-ager says, and stereotypical roles would be reversed. Suburban white kids would choose drug sales over law school in a second, he says.
       

Entertaining
        The movie doesn't flatter privileged teens, but it's great entertainment, and I think audiences will accept it as such.

        In the theater on Wednesday was Col. Will McQueen, chief of the Indian Hill Rangers.

        He liked Traffic's take on the drug war, and he couldn't disagree with its portrayal of addicts. The wealthy are just as vulnerable — plus they can afford excellent lawyers, Col. McQueen said.

        In 1999, his officers made 10 drug arrests in Indian Hill. Last year, 23 people were arrested — most of them juveniles in possession of marijuana, cocaine or crack, he said.

        He has never encountered teens freebasing cocaine as those in the movie do. But if Indian Hill parents travel frequently and leave their teen-agers in charge, it could happen, Col. McQueen said.

        This film isn't about the merits of Cincinnati Country Day School or the morals of Indian Hill.

        It's simply a tough-minded movie about drugs. As such, it sends an appropriate warning to all who would believe they are immune.

       Karen Samples is Kentucky columnist for the Enquirer. She can be reached at 859-578-5584 or ksamples@enquirer.com.

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