There are times while watching Sicario-Day of the Soldado that you feel you are watching the greatest actor on earth. Benicio Del Toro so dominates the screen in this sort of sequel to the brilliant Sicario, much as he did in the original, that you forget there's anybody else in it. His assassin character, Alejandro Gillick, returns here as does Josh Brolin as CIA or whatever it is spook, Matt Graver. Together they are a great tandem, but only Del Toro can maintain that cant take your eyes off him aura with a 16 year old girl, a deaf farmer, a gang of killers, drug cartel goons and alone.
The story is real;y a mish mosh of various story lines that all come together at the end. The beginning, with the border busts of a group of presumably illegals that ends with a Middle Eastern terrorist blowing himself up. Cut to the nations heartland where 4 madmen blow themselves up in a grocery store complete with a harrowing scene of a mother and child trying to sneak out as the final bomber stands in their way saying his prayers. This I took as a complete surrender to the Trump based fear he caters to with his bigotry and racism. But like a lot of this movie, I guessed wrong.
Brolin and Del Toro tear ass around the Middle East, South America and Mexico starting cartel wars while not getting America's hands dirty. But the hands arent only dirty they are downright filthy. When Del Toro takes a 16 year old girl hostage, the daughter of a cartel head who killed his family, the shit is on.
We get changing plot lines , stories about kids on the actual border becoming coyotes, the soulless head of the Department of Defense, the turncoat nature of the drug business and Del Toro trying to keep the girl alive.
Sicario 2 isnt the best movie I've seen this year, but it certainly is the most exciting. It has the greatest actor on earth (there I go again) who will probably get ignored at Oscar time, again, for dominating a decent movie. And its not dumb. You have to pay attention, you have to keep up or you're getting lost.
If you loved the first Sicario, this will be completely in your wheelhouse.
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