"Sicario" - 2015 (DIY belated catch-up with TS movies)

[C C]

Yep, I truly had never watched a single one of the 4 films that Taylor Sheridan wrote before he started making television shows for Paramount. But I discovered that I unknowingly slash accidentally did see one of the minor ones (63%) in the afterward time frame: "Those Who Wish Me Dead" (2021).

I was surprised by one critic comparing the ambience of "Sicario" to "Apocalypse Now" -- because that's exactly what that crossed my mind (along with the realism of 1970s cinema in general, albeit "AN" had that heavy surreal tinge, too). Denis Villeneuve, who directed it, was presumedly responsible for that.

The sequel to "Sicario" isn't supposed to be as good, but I'll probably view it anyway, along with high-ranked "Hell or High Water" and "Wind River".

https://youtu.be/G8tlEcnrGnU

https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/G8tlEcnrGnU

[Syne]

Sicario was good, but it's one of those movies that I got everything I could from it in one viewing. Not much rewatchability, IMO.

[Magical Realist]

I have been putting off seeing this for no good reason. I will watch it in the next few days.

[Yazata]

Denis Villenueve is probably my favorite director. (He directed Arrival too. Sicario is better.)

And Sicario is one of my all-time favorite movies. (Unlike Syne, I can watch it over and over.)

One word for this movie - Intense. Brutal.

Great cast, especially Benicio Del Toro.

Lots of realism in this movie. Big-time moral ambiguity.

About the only people who aren't hiding hidden motives are the cartel (we know who they are, the movie makes that brutally clear), the protagonist (Emily Blunt) and the Benicio Del Toro character (who is a man on a very personal mission). As for the rest, Emily's FBI superiors, the CIA, the Mexican police...

https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/03Tr8OX28Vw

[Syne]

Arrival is much more rewatchable for me.

[Zinjanthropos]

Easily rewatchable. Death of crime boss and his family was one hell of a scene. “Time to meet God” ….yikes… he meant it. Made me wonder if he did meet him/her/it.

[C C]

Easily rewatchable. Death of crime boss and his family was one hell of a scene. “Time to meet God” ….yikes… he meant it. Made me wonder if he did meet him/her/it.

And there was that misdirection event as to who the "sicario" would eventually turn out to be.

BROLIN: "Don't go into the bank, Kate. [...] Umph. And there she goes into the bank..."

BLUNT (later): "I just tried to have sex with my hit man."

[Yazata]

First ten minutes of the movie, how Kate gets involved

https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/hDBqsnv431M

and I just noticed that this clip sorta gives away the movie's big secret, in the movie's first few minutes. Except that nobody who hasn't watched the whole movie would pick up on it. Kate certainly didn't. I'd say more but it would be a huge spoiler.

https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/5ugqZyCixaU

[C C]

"Sicario: Day of the Soldado" ... Same writer but different director (known for Italian crime drama), and consequently different film. No Blunt to be alarmed at the moral ambiguity, and crowded with much more violence.

Doesn't end the way you almost start expecting it to, especially after Gillick survives and Graves goes against orders. But there's no way it could have finished in that predictable Disney manner after Graves' team whisked _X_ off via helicopter.

And there is a "grasshoppers coincidence", since I usually only encounter that particular Mexican state being mentioned once every fifteen years.

GILLICK: "From now on your name is Corina. You come from Oaxaca."

https://youtu.be/sIMChzE_aCo

https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/sIMChzE_aCo