Review of Sicario (2015) by Andrew R — 23 Jan 2016

Emily Blunt's character was an absolute puss in this whole story. She was the only thing slowing it down. She basically cringes in every scene she's in and fails to do anything really meaningful except in her first scene with the group making a key kill.

But she's relegated to the sidelines for almost the entire 3rd act. It became Benecio Del Toro's rendition of Taken for about half an hour, and then BAM here come's Emily again to whine about a guy killing someone's family when she's witnessed endless amounts of horrifying bloodshed for an hour and twenty minutes. She somehow went unhardened in that entire process. She never accepted reality and its horrors, and instead of joining in the fight she just got in its way.

It's still a good film. It just could have been so much more. I don't blame Blunt by the way, she was a fine actress in the film. The writing is to be questioned when you put such heavy emphasis on a character without explaining her properly. From the get-go they obscure the reasons behind her hire, making her more of a plot device than an actual character I should care about. But still they push her forward and I DO care about her because Blunt did a great job of interpreting her internal struggle between ethics and reality.

Yet they never cashed it in. She ends up being a character who constantly seems in too deep and incapable of handling things. It makes her appear weak and the ultimate message becomes unclear. Is the War on Drugs good? Bad? Are our politics with Mexico sound? Is this good for people or not?

Those are profound questions this film had the potential to answer, and it simply passed on them all. With regards to cinematics, it's a beautiful movie that reminded me of Full Metal Jacket and Apocalypse Now, as well as flashbacks from The Hurt Locker. It's gorgeous. But unlike those movies, it doesn't take a definitive stance on what the story really means. I walked away more confused than enlightened and I believe where this could have been art it became shallow and obtuse past the mid-way point. While there are some highlights, the plot just leaves glaring holes filled at awkward times.

Check it out, but don't wet the bed in excitement.