‘Sicario’ sequel is tense, action-packed and a bit of stretch.
“Sicario: Day of the Soldado,” a bloody tale of deception and human trafficking on the U.S.Mexico border, is a thinking person’s action movie — as long as you don’t think too much. Even if it has its share of preposterous moments, it crackles with nonstop tension, combat scenes and double-crosses.
The new, longer titled “Soldado” is a sequel, kind of, to 2015’s “Sicario,” which focused on the drug wars and the vicious cycle that sullied both the drug cartels and the Americans trying to defeat them. This time around, the action centers on the dirty, violent and even more lucrative business of human trafficking on the border. Moreover, the original movie’s main character, idealistic FBI agent Kate Macer (Emily Blunt), has exited stage right, in favor of showier roles for a few returnees: shadowy CIA operative Matt Graver ( Josh Brolin) and ambivalent Mexican assassin Alejandro (Benicio Del Toro).
It’s fair to suggest that a new franchise is being hatched, perhaps a bit cynically, but there’s no denying that this movie is timely and potent in the wake of America’s new “zero tolerance” immigration policy and our country’s complicated border issues. “Soldado,” with its improbable turns, isn’t an authoritative look at the crisis – it’s more a Western action thriller, complete with moral quandaries, that echoes our troubled, sometimes paranoid times.
The wild ride begins on the border, when a routine roundup of illegal immigrants ends shockingly with an explosive act of jihad. It seems that human trafficking cartels in Mexico are allowing terrorists into the United States, and in short order, a group of bad men enter a Kansas City store and blow it up — one of many harrowing, and brilliantly executed, scenes in this movie.
The U.S. government is quick to blame overseas elements, so it dispatches Graver, who is so un-ironic that he’s almost ironic, to “interrogate” a Somali man who is allegedly part of the plot. Dressed in cargo pants and sandals, Graver doesn’t need waterboarding for his torture sessions — everything he needs is in his laptop, and Amnesty International would certainly not give its seal of approval.
Soon thereafter, Graver is dispatched to Washington, where he is assigned to execute a ruse that goes like this: kidnap a cartel leader’s daughter, make sure a rival cartel gets blamed, and then watch the cartels fight each other. That will teach the nasty cartels a lesson about letting terrorists into America.
Graver needs some assistance, natch, so he goes to Mexico City to enlist Alejandro, who apparently has magically developed a conscience since the last movie. These early scenes have a certain pulpy quality, but the alliances of the characters get hazier in an interesting way as the kidnapping ruse begins to fall apart.
Brolin, born to play Graver, is fun to watch, but Del Toro, who has a way of expressing moral struggles with few words, carries the movie.
Director Stefano Sollima proves skillful at staging action sequences, whether it’s a gunfight, a military exercise, a chase or whatever mayhem that screenwriter Taylor Sheridan has cooked up. Anyone can take issue with the credibility of the scenarios presented here, but “Soldado” is beautifully crafted and requires some brain cells. Expect some loose ends in the final frames — but they will leave you wanting more.