Taut, simple-ish but realistic-looking thriller with very downbeat message

Rating: 8/10 (1 March 2017)

As a huge Emily Blunt fan with enthusiasm extending somewhat beyond the purely rational, I was somewhat surprised to see her (in the role of the FBI's Kate Macer) handing over control of the plot - and hence the starring role - on at least two occasions in "Sicario" - in an interesting enough technique and one we get to see deployed surprisingly rarely in films. Still, Emily does not disappoint in her role, though Benicio del Toro as Alejandro certainly has a mountain of screen presence, and his part differs from hers in remaining competent at all times, while Macer is in truth out of her depth as she joins a combined-agencies anti-drugs operation (initially detailed quite well and - one would feel - extremely realistically, but later assuming more of a "sketchy" look). A further co-star here is Josh Brolin, who sadly comes up with the distinctly irritating character of Matt Graver (CIA). Nevertheless, one is more than tempted to believe that those with "the A" can indeed be like this, so presumably it's only reasonable.
The plot here is a relatively straightforward one, which the above mini-description goes a long way towards encapsulating; but the "fun" here, while it lasts, lies in the depiction of some very "interesting" relationships on and around the US-Mexican border (at times well or even stunningly presented by aerial shots and so on). Indeed, how could this border be other than a star of the film in its own right - given the truth about the circumstances of the neighbouring El Paso (Texas) and Ciudad Juarez (Mexico)? For there they sit, with normal-ish, civilised life on one side of the border and anarchy and misery and mass murder on the other. Art of course imitates life here, as documentaries like Simon Reeve's excellent "Tropic of Cancer" and the superb "Toughest Place to be a Nurse" (both HUGELY to be recommended, by the way) have covered this ground in reality, and indeed Sicario's fictionalised version cannot top those real-life stories, though we do at least know how authentic and impressive (impressively scary) the former looks.
This film does no favours to Mexico as a tourist destination or in any other light, but it throws up the expected number of questions about what methods are justified and who are really the good guys - indeed it probably asks more questions even than we anticipate (not least in a very interesting vignette starring Julio Cedillo).
Real answers seem few and far between, however, and the fact that this is now "the way of the world" hardly seems satisfactory, all the more so given the potential sentence-ending of "and forever will be"... We know this is a war that is not being won, and we can scarcely extract much satisfaction from the idea that "desperate situations call for desperate measures".
Naturally, our Emily stays on the right side of that kind of line - pretty much; but then she is told in no uncertain terms what we the viewers have already come to appreciate (perhaps even shockingly, given our experiences of supremely self-assured Blunt characters, such as the one in "Edge of Tomorrow") - that here is someone whose methods fail and are out-of-date, a fish out of water (as indeed anybody interested in traditional, transparent procedures would now seem to be). And that is a far from pretty thought.
Overall, then, this film offers up an appropriate degree of tension, looks mostly authentic, and leaves one feeling both alarmed and miserable. Job well done, then, Director Denis Villeneuve and writer Taylor Sheridan, but in no way is this any kind of pleasure watching.
Worthwhile it probably will be, however, and much recommended for that reason...