Sicario

I haven't seen much of Denis Villeneuve's work so far; I first saw his breakthrough film Incendies, which I thought was really solid but undone by an over-the-top twist, and then saw his American debut, the gripping and powerful Prisoners. Over the course of those two movies, though, it's become hard to deny Villeneuve's directorial skills, taking his thriller plots and turning them into something more affecting, more powerful, more thoughtful. And now comes Sicario, which plays to his strengths beautifully and minimizes the plot missteps of those previous films, turning what could have been a simple thriller about drug cartels into a tense, draining, intense experience that often floored me with its skill. Sicario doesn't waste time, opening with a SWAT raid on a drug house that turns out to be hiding a nightmarish secret; from there, the film follows the squad leader (played beautifully by the reliably great Emily Blunt) as she gets involved with a shady operation to "shake up" the cartels and get to those making the decisions. And as things get more and more chaotic, the question is constantly raised of where we draw the line between following the law and doing what needs to be done - or if such a line should be drawn at all. It's a question that gets raised in many movies, but Sicario handles it perfectly, asking the right questions, refusing to give easy answers, and forcing us to look at the realities of both situations. Even apart from the weighty questions, though, Sicario works on a more visceral, effective level, delivering at least three flawless set pieces that left me unbearably tense, and rarely - if ever - letting that tension ease throughout. The great performances only help things along; along with Blunt as the tough, honest newcomer, there's Josh Brolin as the smug, uncomfortably funny head of the operation, and Benicio del Toro as a mysterious consultant whose very presence lends unease to the situation. Sicario has a couple of minor missteps - a plot thread about a Mexican policeman does what it needs to but never feels less than tacked on, and a couple of plot revelations are treated as more surprising than they really are - but the emphasis there should be on "minor." As a whole, it's an intense, astonishing piece of work, one that's absolutely beautifully filmed (what else do you expect from cinematographer Roger Deakins?), solidly acted, and morally complex; that it takes on real world issues so directly and still makes for such a great piece of entertainment is just testament to the skill of everyone involved.

- Josh Mauthe

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