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Mixed or average reviews - based on 7 Critics What's this?

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  • Summary: In 1979, the US Customs Service reported that 87% of all marijuana seizures in the US were made in the South Florida area. Due to the region's 5,000 miles of coast and coastal waterways and close proximity to the Caribbean and Latin America, South Florida was a pot smuggler's paradise. In sharp contrast to the brazenly violent cocaine cowboys of the 1980's, Miami's marijuana smugglers were cooler, calmer, and for the most part, nonviolent. Square Grouper paints a vivid portrait of Miami's pot smuggling culture in the 1970s and 1980s through three of the city's most colorful stories. (Magnolia Pictures) Expand
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 3 out of 7
  2. Negative: 0 out of 7
  1. Reviewed by: Andrew O'Hehir
    Apr 16, 2011
    80
    If "Cocaine Cowboys" was an epic, ironic yarn of murder and madness and the building of a boomtown built largely on drug money, Square Groupers is a more rueful tale.
  2. Reviewed by: Mark Holcomb
    Apr 12, 2011
    60
    Square Grouper's admirably backhanded inquiry into the social and economic costs of weed criminalization extends far beyond the wake-and-bake crowd.
  3. Reviewed by: Joe Leydon
    Apr 12, 2011
    40
    Think of it as the cinematic equivalent of a buzz-kill.
  4. Reviewed by: Rachel Saltz
    Apr 14, 2011
    40
    The film mixes period footage with visually unappealing contemporary interviews. If you're expecting voluble, outsize personalities with colorful war stories, you'll be disappointed.

See all 7 Critic Reviews