"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

[Yazata]

A real life Sicario movie has broken out in Mexico today after the Mexican army, acting on intelligence from the United States (and maybe with US special forces participation), killed Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes known as 'El Mencho' - the boss of the CJNG cartel, in the outskirts of Puerto Vallarta in Jalisco. (El Mencho was a certifiable asshole with no end of blood on his hands, who certainly deserves to be dead.)

And as a result, full scale all-against-all street warfare has broken out all across Mexico. This major cartel is fighting the Mexican military, as different cartel factions fight each other for control of the multi-billion-dollar criminal enterprise.

Video coming out of Mexico looks exactly like scenes from a Sicario movie.

Mexican armored vehicle on the street in Aguascalientes.

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Mexican military Blackhawk helicopter using its minigun to fire on CJNG in Ixtapa. Unconfirmed reports say that the CJNG fighters attacked a prison there, killed multiple guards and released an unknown number of inmates. The Mexican army has set up roadblocks.

https://x.com/All_Source_News/status/202...6378139099

Fighting in Veracruz, on the Mexican Gulf coast.

https://x.com/All_Source_News/status/202...0787867746

Battle with lots of automatic weapons fire between the Mexican army and CJNG on the northern outskirts of Puerto Vallarta.

https://x.com/sentdefender/status/2025671670019608631

People fleeing the terminal at Puerto Vallarta airport after CJNG gunmen stormed the place.

https://x.com/All_Source_News/status/202...3634952645

Panic inside the Guadalajara civic hospital

https://x.com/FaytuksNetwork/status/2025649097428898031

CJNG says stay in your homes, we have orders to kill anyone who gets in our way.

[Image: HByZ2J-WMAAsSSK?format=jpg&name=small]

[Image: HByhuyoWEAAfNYx?format=jpg&name=small]

CJNG in Michoacan is offering 20,000 Mexican pesos for each dead Mexican soldier. (That's $1,168 US)

[Image: HByWalJXMAAxWyn?format=jpg&name=small]