Review: Sicario: Day of the Soldado
Perhaps without the long shadow cast by its predecessor, the sequel/spin-off Sicario: Day of the Soldado would have seemed a riveting piece of work. Certainly Italian director Stefano Sollima knows his way around gritty crime dramas, having helmed the acclaimed series All Cops are Bastards and the excellent mafia thriller Suburra. Soldado also possesses the existentialism so characteristic of Michael Mann's work, though its nature is far meaner and, at times, less merciful.
Soldado finds returning screenwriter Taylor Sheridan training his focus from cartels trafficking drugs to cartels trafficking humans across the U.S.-Mexican border. After two separate suicide bombings, the U.S. government suspects that some of those humans may be terrorists. This does not sit right with U.S. Secretary of Defense James Riley (Matthew Modine), who tells those responsible in a press conference that "Your bombs don't terrify us, they empower us...to send you the full weight of the United States military." Behind the scenes, however, the government is targeting the Mexican cartels they believe responsible for aiding and abetting the terrorists and they believe that the only way to disrupt this is by inciting a war between the cartels. For this, they need others to carry out their dirty work.
Enter CIA agent Matt Graver (Josh Brolin) and sicario Alejandro (Benicio del Toro), who hatch a plan to head to Mexico City, disguise themselves as a rival gang, kidnap the daughter (Isabela Moner) of one of the cartel kingpins, and sit back and watch chaos ensue. Unfortunately, the chaos involves major blowback for the U.S. government, who promptly scrambles to ensure their fingerprints are nowhere to be found, even if it involves getting rid of the kingpin's daughter with whom Alejandro has bonded. This particular narrative strand allows Del Toro more of an opportunity to shade Alejandro with more soulfulness than in the original. The same applies to Brolin who, it must be said, is having quite a banner year, both critically and commercially.
However, despite all the elements being done well, there's a nagging pointlessness to Soldado that just cannot be ignored. Part of it is due to the sameness of the themes being explored - how much humanity can we retain in a world where violence begets violence begets violence - which perhaps would not feel so heavily monotonous had there been a character like Emily Blunt's in the original. Though Moner's character is somewhat posited as someone to invest in, someone whose fate feels uncertain, her perspective is not as complex and textured as Blunt's character and therefore the darkness that pervades Soldado is not as impactful.
Sicario: Day of the Soldado
Directed by: Stefano Sollima
Written by: Taylor Sheridan
Starring: Benicio Del Toro, Josh Brolin, Isabela Moner, Jeffrey Donovan, Catherine Keener, Manuel Garcia-Rulfo, Matthew Modine, Shea Whigham, Elijah Rodriguez
