Sicario (2015)

A Disappointing Continuation

One of the best movies of the year! Incredible from the beginning to the end.

Yes, absolutely, there is fun to be had, as well as many, many things to go boom, all amid an atmospheric urban jungle.

One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

If you wanna see a movie where nothing is gonna happen, than watch this. You're gonna see a lot of talking between the characters and A LOT of shots from the ground, filmed from a helicopter.. Such a wast of time..

The opening scene shows a swat team invading a house. Two guys sit calmly watching TV in the living room when the armored vehicle crashes thru the wall. Eventually the swat team opens up newly dry-walled walls, the screw holes having been spackled. Inside the walls are dozens of dead bodies, wrapped in plastic, standing upright. What is wrong with this? The guys watching TV have no problem with the smell of decaying corpses. The swatters don't smell anything until they start opening the walls. The corpses stand upright without any visible support (rigor mortis is very temporary). The walls are being prepared for painting. Did they think no one would notice how thick the walls would have to be to enclose dead bodies?

The action set pieces are terrific, there is heavy realism, the morality aspect binds the entire movie together. Great performances from all actors.

Denis Villeneuve is on a roll...........this film is great and only enhances his position as one of the best up and coming modern directors today. Right from the opening scenes this film entices you in and never lets go of you, it is incredibly tense and hard to watch at times. There are two main reasons this film grabs a hold of you, one being the fantastic story/writing and the other is the characters/performances. The directing across the board is sublime, gorgeous shots of Mexico that are obviously enhanced by Roger Deakins cinematography. These beautiful wide angel shots are complimented extremely well with really close up action set pieces. The set piece across the boarder in the traffic jam has got to be one of the most tense scenes in a film recently, incredible work.As previously mention the story/writing of this film is extremely good and makes for a riveting watch. It carries along a really tough subject with a lot of complex character background without letting one overshadowing the other. All the characters backstories are fleshed out really well throughout the film whilst still contributing to the overall story. Taylor Sheridan definitely deserves a shout out for this, really good work. A story that I've never seen before, extremely realistic and grounded.The cast is very very good, firstly Emily Blunt who is the audiences eyes as the film progresses as she is seeing the same things we are for the first time. Plays a sort of fish out of water but can stand her own ground. What I mean by fish out of water is the fact that she is completely out of her depth and doesn't know what is going in the outset. Her character arc throughout is really good and has a satisfying end. Josh Brolin is very good as the charismatic leader of the team that definitely has his complexities to him. As the film goes a long you never really know 100 percent if he is telling the whole truth, he is a little bit wild and unpredictable. This makes is relationship between his character and Blunts all the more interesting. However the best performance of the film is Benicio del Toro, just jaw dropping at times, is seemingly peaceful and friendly one minute and the next he is brutally murdering people. Fantastic performance all round, probably has the most depth to his character as well, as to the reason why he is helping the Americans. Brutally fantastic.Last couple of positives are Roger Deakins, his cinematography is always incredible and is probably the best cinematography around, truly beautiful work. The last positive is the score by Johann Johannsson which is extremely haunting and only increases the tension throughout the film, simply brilliant score and fantastic use of it, it comes and goes and is only used when necessary.Overall this film is 85% out of 100 or 8.5 out of 10, this is a very good film that has opened up an entirely new genre to explore, fantastic work from Denis Villeneuve, will this man ever make a bad film, probably not. Taylor Sheridan for the incredible story and characters. The three main cast members are all fantastic, must also quickly shoutout Daniel Kaluuya, good little role from him. Score and Cinematography are real highlights as well, there aren't any negatives really, I suppose it can drag a little and pace of the film can be hit and miss at times. All in all and truly great film not for everyone but extremely riveting and entertaining.