Sicario

Let’s say you’ve been given three wishes by one of those C-list celebrities that keep appearing as the Ghost of Christmas Whatever in Hallmark specials. What do you wish for? Since I like to think of myself as a good person, I’d probably spend the first two wishes ridding the world of hunger and violence or cleaning up our carbon footprint with a snap of my fingers. But my third? That one I might waste on unlimited money, so I could continue to make movies that solidifies Emily Blunt as the biggest action star of our generation. Forget Scarlett Johansson; after The Huntsman: Winter’s War, Sicario, and Edge of Tomorrow, Blunt is the woman to beat in my book.

‘Sicario’ is an exercise in prolonged tension like few others. Every moment from the first scene to the last is suspenseful. The opening, a deadly raid on a drug kingpin’s safe house establishes a terrifying precedent: In this film, violence can erupt at any time without any warning, and no one and nothing can be trusted. Having thoroughly unsettled the audience, director Denis Villeneuve keeps viewers on edge with shifty characters, sudden bursts of gunfire, and the careful use of a persistent, pounding score. Remember the scene in Boogie Nights where Alfred Molina is randomly tossing firecrackers at Mark Wahlberg and John C. Reilly? Sicario is like that scene for two straight hours with no “Sister Christian.” It is intense.