Three stars. Rated R, for violence, profanity and dramatic intensity
By Derrick Bang
2015’s Sicario was an impeccably self-contained story that resolved in just the right manner. Under no circumstances did it require a sequel; conceptually, that would be like demanding a sequel to Casablanca.
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| When unforeseen events separate them from the rest of an American mercenary force, Alejandro (Benicio Del Toro) wonders how best to protect Isabel (Isabela Moner) ... and, indeed, if he should bother. |
But Hollywood rarely is guided by art, when commerce stands ready to interfere. Sicario proved unexpectedly successfully, and actor-turned-writer Taylor Sheridan was on a roll, having also delivered the terrific original scripts for 2016’s Hell or High Water and last year’s Wind River.
In fairness, it perhaps could be argued that Benicio Del Toro’s mysterious Alejandro, by far the most intriguing character in Sicario, deserved another look.
Sheridan gave it a good try. At its best, Sicario: Day of the Soldado has the multi-layered, parallel storylines that made 2000’s Traffic so compelling (and which, coincidentally, brought Del Toro an Academy Award). But Sheridan’s writing isn’t nearly as tight this time; a few plot details are fuzzy, and at one point simply daft.
More conspicuously, the film stumbles its way to a thoroughly unsatisfying conclusion. The final 10 to 15 minutes feel as if director Stefano Sollima impulsively handed the reins to somebody far less qualified. Director Denis Villeneuve did a far superior job with the first film.
That said, Sheridan certainly cooks up a disturbing premise, which feels like a logical extension of our fear-driven world.
A pair of seemingly unrelated suicide bomber events — one during a foiled illegal immigrant crossing at the Mexico/Texas border, the other in a suburban Kansas big-box store laden with shoppers — leads U.S. intelligence agencies to an alarming conclusion: that Middle East terrorists are being ferried to Mexico by tanker ships “conveniently” ignored by Somali pirates, and then concealed among hopeful immigrants guided across the border by drug cartel traffickers.
Responding to demands from the (unseen) U.S. president that something be done to stop this, Secretary of Defense James Riley (Matthew Modine) summons CIA Deputy Director Cynthia Foard (Catherine Keener) and her favorite mercenary “fixer,” federal agent Matt Graver (Josh Brolin). The latter has become darker, scarier and more cynical since the case he shared with Emily Blunt’s Kate Macer, in Sicario; he now believes that a desired end justifies any means.
Trafficking has become epidemic, Matt reasons, because of greed-inspired harmony between rival Mexican cartels. Provoke a war between cartels, and that accord will cease in a violent heartbeat; the resulting chaos will put an end to terrorist trafficking. (This conclusion seems unduly optimistic.) And the best way to create an internecine cartel war lies not with killing a king, but with kidnapping a prince.
Or, as it turns out, a princess.
