Category: Suspense

Those Who Wish Me Dead

Rated: MA15+Those Who Wish Me Dead

Directed by: Taylor Sheridan

Screenplay by: Michael Koryta, Charles Leavitt and Taylor Sheridan

Based on the Book by: Michael Koryta

Produced by: Steven Zaillian, Garrett Basch, p.g.a., Aaron L. Gilbert, Kevin Turen, Taylor Sheridan, p.g.a.

Starring: Angelina Jolie, Finn Little, Jon Bernthal, Aidan Gillen, Nicholas Hoult, Jake Weber, Medina Senghore, Tyler Perry, Boots Southerland, Tory Kittles, James Jordan, Lora Martinez-Cunningham, Howard Ferguson JR., Ryan Jason Cook, Laura Niemi.

“I did the right thing.”

Those Who Wish Me Dead has everything I expected from a Taylor Sheridan film.

The edge-of-your-seat suspense hits from the opening scene: with flashes to black to a parashuter, smokejumper Hannah (Angelina Jolie) falling into the smoke of a raging fire.

Then the layering of story, that impending doom as forensic accountant Owen (Jake Weber) flees with his son Connor (Finn Little) – there’s a directive to kill those who know too much.  No survivors.  It’s a zero sum game.

So father and son escape to the forests of Montana where Owen’s late wife’s brother lives – Ethan (Jon Bernthal), also a sheriff.

But if the worst happens, Owen gives his son a note with all his secrets, to, ‘Give to someone you can trust.’

When Hannah finds Owen wandering in the forest, is she someone he can trust?

She’s a firefighter, haunted by nightmares of her past.  She’s a tough cookie, loved by her team, her fellow firies who see the wild as she drinks, releases a parachute from the back of a truck while still attached.

What they don’t see is her guilt.  But Ethan sees her.  He’s also her ex.

The small town relationships are intertwined – a delicate balance as two hitmen, (Aidan Gillen, Nicholas Hoult) bring disaster, chasing down survivors.  Chasing a young boy who knows too much.

There’s a lot going on in this film but it’s all so well handled and balanced I felt like I was watching this intense story unfold in real time.  While gripping the arms of the cinema chair, holding my breath.

Those Who Wish Me Dead

As well as the suspense, there some shocks and jumps alongside the well-thought crime thriller.

There’s also the relationships, authentic characters and awe inspiring scenery (director of photography Ben Richardson (Wind River (2017)) – those huge expanses of landscape, the clouds and then the fire storm devouring everything like a monster.  Like Hannah’s demons come back to chase her.

But even more than a great story (love a movie based on a book if the screenplay is done right) and cinematic shots and detail like gunfire flashing light in the eye of a killer – every single character was perfectly cast and absolutely believable.

Angelina was made for this role – down to earth, tough, haunted, fighting her way back from guilt by saving this kid.

So there’s a focus on the drama in this film rather than a deep dive into the case the forensic accountant was running away from.  And wow, a rarity for me, the finely balanced intricacies of the drama was more compelling than the crime.  Very rare.

Yet still – that suspense!

Yeah, I liked this movie.  Every bit.

Black Box (Boîte Noire)

Rated: MBlack Box (Boîte Noire)

Directed and Written by: Yann Gozlan

Produced by: Wassim Béji, Thibault Gast, Mattias Weber

Starring: Pierre Niney, Lou de Laâge, André Dussollier, Sébastien Pouderoux, Oliver Rabourdin.

French with English Subtitles

“Make the CVR (Cockpit Voice Recorder) talk”, says Renier, head of BEA (Bureau of Enquiry and Analysis for Civil Aviation Safety) (André Dussollier) to investigator Mathieu (Pierre Niney) after an Atrian 800 passenger plane goes down for, ‘Reasons unknown.’

Just starting to write this review you can already see there’s a lot of tech-speak in this film.  Which I enjoyed.  The analytics conducted by main character Mathieu just added another dimension to this suspenseful investigation of what really caused a brand new aircraft to crash during it’s flight from Dubai to Paris.

Mathieu specialises in acoustics.  He’s precise.  He can hear changes in black box recordings other investigators can’t.   But the price of his skill is not being able to stop hearing.

He’s always questioning, always listening, even when his team leader, Pollack (Rabourdin) tells him to stop.  Even when his wife, Noémie (Lou de Laâge) becomes afraid he’s hearing things that aren’t there.

The film invites the audience to listen as carefully as Mathieu as he investigates, literally pulling me to the edge of my seat, following the twists of this mystery as the story goes deeper.

I really don’t want to go into detail about the storyline or give anything away.  But to say I was completely absorbed into the film, the scenes flowing from one moment to the next, the layering of one moment so the first viewing is given a whole new perspective when replayed again later as Mathieu visualises the moments before the crash, like piecing together a puzzle, so we see how his mind works.

He’s, ‘Very clear and precise.’

‘Don’t get Pollack’s (Oliver Rabourdin) back up’, says Noémie.  ‘There’s more to a job than skill’.

To which Mathieu replies, ‘So I say nothing?’

He’s fearless in his need to find the truth, yet doesn’t need to wave a flag about it.

This is a finely tuned and balanced suspense-thriller that had me hanging on every turn.

Release part of the 32nd AF French Film Festival 2021

 

1917

Rated: MA15+1917

Directed by: Sam Mendes

Written by: Sam Mendes & Krysty Wilson-Cairns

Produced by: Sam Mendes, p.g.a., Pippa Harris, p.g.a., Jayne-Ann Tenggren, p.g.a., Callum McDougall, p.g.a., Brian Oliver

Executive Producers: Jeb Brody, Oleg Petrov, Ignacio Salazar-Simpson, Ricardo Marco Budé

Starring: George MacKay, Dean-Charles Chapman, Mark Strong, Andrew Scott, Richard Madden, Claire Duburcq with Colin Firth and Benedict Cumberbatch.

A tense, end-of-seat drama about mateship and the moments in the machine of war that gives a solider back his humanity. 

April 6, 1917 is when two young British soldiers, Lance Corporal Schofield (George MacKay) and Lance Corporal Blake (Dean-Charles Chapman) are handed the task of saving sixteen-hundred lives.

Thinking the Germans have cut and run, Colonel Mackenzie (Benedict Cumberbatch) plans to give chase, to make a real difference in this bloody war, without realising the retreat is a trap – a strategy to lure the soldiers to certain death.  One of those men, Blakes own brother.

This is a high-stakes drama that rides on the suspense rather than confronting with the gore of war.  This is about mateship and family and the drive to help even when exhaustion is so deep you could drown just to rest.

1917 is a linear story that follows the conversation of the two mates as they take the task of the near impossible, across No Man’s Land, through the trenchers of the enemy, behind enemy lines, through a countryside not their own.

It’s a contrast of rotting dead bodies and wildflowers as we follow the young men, as they meet fellow soldiers on their mission, as they battle through traps and trip wires and giant rats.

The tension runs high because the film follows the story of the two soldiers closely so no one knows what comes next.

‘Sometimes, men just want to fight,’ warns General Erinmore (Colin Firth), the man sending them on their mission.

The only thing that matters is getting that message to Mackenzie.

A lot has to be said about the soundtrack here, a low vibrating drone creating that just below the surface feeling something bad is about to happen.

I jumped, that tension breaking with a shot or unexpected fall – you know that bad thing that happens.  Not the super bad or expected, but the papercut or trip.  That blip in life that catches you unaware.  It’s kinda like that, but in a war, the consequences of a slip equals death.

I’m not a fan of war movies because it all gets a bit too real, too confronting.  And there were moments here that stirred that anger.  But this isn’t gory, it’s more about the suspense and characters, the young men fighting to make sense of where they are and where they’re being ordered to go.  And making sense of it in the little things: giving a hand to get a truck out of a bog, to hand over a bottle to another because he knows he’s going to need it more.  That’s how to make sense of it.  By understanding the little things.

Parasite

Rated: MA15+Parasite

Directed by: Bong Joon-Ho

Story by: Bong Joon Ho

Screenplay by: Bong Joon Ho, Han Jin Won

Produced by: Kwak Sin Ae, Moon Yang Kwon

Executive Producer: Miky Lee

Starring: SONG Kang Ho, LEE Sun Kyun, CHO Yeo Jeong, CHOI Woo Shik, PARK So Dam, CHANG Hyae Jin, JUNG ZISO, JUNG Hyeon Jun, LEE Jung Eun.

Winner d’Or Cannes Film Festival

Official Competition Sydney Film Festival

Director and writer Bong Joon-Ho describes Parasite as, ‘a comedy without clowns, a tragedy without villains.’

And Joon-Ho has certainly captured a film with a difference here, where the story starts off one way, then evolves into something else so the film’s like a journey into a way of thinking or a thought that creeps up.

Parasite starts off about a struggling family, living in a sub-basement where they contemplate putting up a sign, ‘No urinating’ because of the drunk that is forever pissing outside their window.

The father, Ki-Taek (Song, Kang Ho) has no job after several failed business ventures; the mother, Chung-Sook (Chang Hyae Jin) is a former national medallist in the hammer throw who keeps house as best she can amongst the stink beetles and cardboard pizza boxes the family assemble to at least have some money coming in.

Getting cut-off from the wi-fi because the neighbour has changed their password, son, Ki-Woo (Choi Woo Shik) and daughter, Ki-Jung (Park So Dam) wave their phones around, trying to find a connection, waving past a fan cover with socks hanging, eventually finding connection up on the raised toilet.

It’s desperate times, but the family struggles together.

Until Ki-Woo gets an opportunity to tutor a rich kid.

Posing as a college graduate, Ki-Woo burrows into the life of the Park family, also a family of four, with Mr. Park (Lee Sun Kyun) CEO of a global IT firm and young wife Yeon-Kyo (Cho Yeo Jeong) who stays at home with their two young children.

Ki-Woo plans and manipulates this rich family to keep his family together – to get them jobs as well, despite the fact all the positions are already filled.  And it’s easy.  The family are so nice.  But they can be nice.  They’re rich.

There’s so much more to this film than the concept of the haves and have-nots.  Yet, this is the central idea shown with symbolism like flood water running down steps – from the beauty and green grass and clean lines of a house built by an architect to catch the sun, running down to the squalor of the streets below, flooded with raw sewage.

There’s a line – Mr. Park even stating, ‘I can’t stand people who cross the line’ – and as the film progresses the more stark the difference between those above and those below.

I can see why this film is winning awards.  There’s so much thought and layering in the story, carefully unveiled.

From light humour capturing how families are, to the horror of a class divide that keeps getting deeper shown with the revelation of ignorance and the fight to protect family; the individual fights against circumstance until the eventual learned behaviour: with no plan, nothing can go wrong.

The portrayal of what feels like a true-to-life tragedy is made to feel authentic because of the lightness and brevity of the family on the edge of starvation; the desperation turning relatable, intelligent people into something else.

Like the film is saying: it’s not like people who are desperate don’t know they’re desperate.

So there’s more than the class divide growing wider and the actions the desperate make trying to survive, there’s self-reflection.

Annabelle Comes Home

Rated: MAnnabelle Comes Home

Directed by: Gary Dauberman

Written by: Gary Dauberman and James Wan

Produced by: Peter Safran, James Wan

Starring: McKenna Grace, Madison Iseman, Katie Sarife, Patrick Wilson, Vera Farmiga.

‘Not all ghosts are bad, right?’

In this third instalment of the Annabelle series, we find Lorraine (Vera Farmiga) and Ed Warren (Patrick Wilson) taking the doll, Annabelle off the hands of some very frightened nurses – circa the end of The Conjuring (2013).

The relationship between Ed and Lorraine is as always, close and personal and sweet – unlike their life’s work of containing the demons infesting the lives of those still of this world.

It’s a familiar feeling, seeing the Warrens return, and the doll, Annabelle.

James Wan (director and co-writer of, The Conjuring 2 (2016) and also co-writer of the original, The Conjuring) co-wrote this instalment, along with Gary Dauberman.  But the direction is all Dauberman – his debut after successfully writing the two previous Annabelle films.

And the atmosphere is tense.

There’s something about Lorrain’s eyes that’s used so well here – the expressive concern compared to the doll’s wooden cracked stare.  This is just one of the many techniques used to ramp-up the tension.

The demonologists leave their young daughter Judy (McKenna Grace) in the hands of the ever-reliable baby-sitter Mary Ellen (Madison Iseman) while they venture out to another job.

Most of the film is set in that 70s style house of laminate kitchen, low hanging lights and orange and brown decor.  Back to the house holding the room with three locks and a sign asking, Do Not Touch Anything; filled with all the objects touched with evil, to have a priest pray over every week to keep the demons where they’re supposed to be: contained.

This is the focus of the film, the Occult Museum and the misguided friend, Daniela (Katie Sarife) who releases all within in it.

The film isn’t about Lorraine and Ed, this is about the three young girls fighting for their souls and sanity while the demon that controls the doll Annabelle acts as a beacon that calls all the other spirits.

The suspense is built on the creepy atmosphere of the house, bit by bit – the sounds of static and touches of orchestral sounds keeping up the edge.  And the turn of light through blue, green, yellow and red cellophane revealing hidden spirits turn the house into something like a freak show – all set to a sometimes still silence while you wait and wait for that next scare.

There’s some lightness to break the tension, ‘Don’t touch her, you’ll get obsessed,’ says one kid at Judy’s school.

And there’s a kind of sweetness to the relationship between the girls and the want-to-be-brave boyfriend that manages not to be cheesy, making Annabelle Comes Home not horrific but still scary because of the suspense.

Some of the objects in that room really get the heart pumping – who would have thought a reflection seen in an old tube TV could be so creepy.

So there’s plenty of tension but the violence doesn’t evolve.  It’s more the threat that kept me on edge.

In the end, the film felt more like a homage to the Warren family, with the recent passing of Lorraine Warren: 1927 – 2019.

I wonder if she’s still floating about, haunting anything – like ringing her spirit bells, just for fun.

Greta

Rated: MA15+Greta

Directed by: Neil Jordan

Written by: Neil Jordan, Ray Wright

Produced by: James Flynn, Lawrence Bender, John Penotti

Starring: Isabelle Huppert, Chlöe Grace Moretz, Maika Monroe.

Like the ominous drone of a train running through the tunnels of the New York City subway, Greta is all about the darkness that runs beneath the surface.

Frances (Chlöe Grace Moretz) has that newly-arrived innocence.  She hasn’t been bitten by the nasty of New York.  Originally from Boston, she lives with her best friend Erica (Maika Monroe (It Follows (2015)) in her loft.

Frances still believes in doing the right thing.  Until she meets Greta (Isabelle Huppert).

Greta has thought of the perfect ruse, preying on the kindness of ‘suckers’: she leaves a green leather bag on the train with an identity card, amongst other convincing paraphernalia, noting her address.

So when Frances finds the bag (and Lost and Found is closed – but would they be closed all the time?  I wasn’t entirely convinced…), she takes the bag back to the rightful owner – much to the disgrace of Erica: ‘This city’s going to eat you alive’.

A telling statement for what’s to come.

The kindness of the older French woman, Greta, seems to fill a hole in Frances’ life; to become the mother figure that’s missing after the death of her mother the year before.

But Greta is sticky.

And as the worldly-wise Erica says, The more persistent, the more crazy.

Writer and director Neil Jordan, ‘saw GRETA as a story about obsession. Every friendship begins with a promise of sorts, he believes: “‘I’ll be your friend if you’ll be mine. We’ll share things. I’ll tell you about my life, if you tell me about yours.’ If those little gestures are used in a malevolent way it becomes kind of terrifying.’

Greta feels like a classic style of psychological thriller, such as the stalking films, Misery (1990) and Fatal Attraction (1987); but with the older crazy woman being the seductress of a young girl.  Greta invades the life of Frances, demanding everything like an obsessed lover.

Isabelle Huppert, ‘interpreted the script as an ambiguous love story.’

And the closeup camerawork make the most of Chlöe Graces’ (as Frances) pretty face that adds to that strange dynamic of: Surrogate daughter? Friend? Lover?

But I’m not sure why this dynamic didn’t quite resonate with me – the idea of the trap is clever.

As is the splicing and camerawork of the descent of Frances’ capture.

There’s this strange brevity from Isabelle Huppert as Greta, her clever euphemisms and light dancing of stockinged feet giving Greta more dimension than just crazy.

I believed the kindness and intelligence more than the psychopathic nature of her character.

And I think this is because the depth of psychology or explanation wasn’t explored – why was Greta crazy?

And what happened to her husband?

Not the psychological thriller I was hoping for but there’s some clever here with some tense and surprising moments.

Hunter Killer

Rated: MA15+Hunter Killer

Directed by: Donovan Marsh

Screenplay by: Arne L. Schmidt and Jamie Moss

Based on: The Novel “Firing Point” written by George Wallace and Don Keith

Produced by: Neal H. Moritz and Toby Jaffe, Gerard Butler, Alan Siegel, Tucker Tooley, Mark Gill, John Thompson, Matt O’Toole, Les Weldon

Starring: Gerard Butler, Gary Oldman, Common, Linda Cardellini, Michael Nyqvist and Toby Stephens.

HUNTER KILLER ( hən(t)ərˈkilər ): a naval vessel, especially a submarine, equipped to locate and destroy enemy vessels, especially other submarines.

Based on the book, “Firing Point” written by George Wallace (retired commander of the nuclear attack submarine, USS Houston), and award-winning journalist, Don Keith, Hunter Killer has action above and below the water.

Russian and American submarines play cat and mouse under the heaving Barents Sea; the Americans ghosting a Russian sub when they watch it being blown to pieces.

The Cold War may have ceased above ground, but below the surface of the ocean, torpedos are incoming.

When the American sub goes off-radar, the Brass above ground, trigger-happy Admiral Charles Donnegan, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (Gary Oldman) and the more cautious Rear Admiral John Fisk (Common) along with senior National Security Agency analyst Jayne Norquist (Linda Cardellini), send the only Hunter Killer they have nearby, the USS Arkansas: enter ‘pride runs deep’ Captain Joe Glass (Gerard Butler).

When the USS Arkansas crew discover they’ve just sailed into a coup with Russian President Zakarin (Alexander Diachenko) held captive by Admiral Dmitri Durov (Michael Gor) gone rogue, it’s a high-stakes play to extract the president from Russian soil without starting WWIII.

Riding the helm, director, Donovan Marsh (iNumber, Number (2017)) uses three threads to tell the story: the convert battle from the sub, the Black Ops team on the ground and the tension in the War Room; a successful technique condensing a complicated military novel into a comprehensive film.

Yet unable to resist that action military cheese that dominates this genre, the screenwriters throw in lines like, ‘We’re not enemies, we’re brothers’, from Glass.

And you can just see it, the Gary Oldman character Admiral Charles Donnegan stating, ‘When someone makes a move on a chessboard, you respond.’

So, there’s that.

And the shifting of the Russians speaking their native language to then speak English, to each other when really, they’d be speaking Russian, constantly jolted me out of that suspension of reality.

Sticking to Russian with English subtitles would have given the film more authenticity and impact.  A shame because there’s so much effort with the detail of the sub, Marsh placing the film’s entire submarine set on a massive hydraulic gimbal to forge realistic movement.  And the U.S. Navy contributing and advising through-out to get the details as close to the real deal as possible.  To have all that effect taken away by a few pieces of dialogue was disappointing.

I will say that although there were cheesy moments with the brothers-in-arms rhetoric, Gerard Butler brings it in a role more subdued, yet quietly still the man of action Captain.  And Michael Nyqvist as the Russian counter-part, Captain Andropov, added to the tone of brave men making life and death decisions.

Rest In Peace Michael Nyqvist who passed away in June 2017.

And wow, the action and suspense really ramps-up as the story of the film builds.

Overall, not the best I’ve seen in the genre but the suspense and action make Hunter Killer worth a watch.

First Man

Rated: MFirst Man

Directed by: Damien Chazelle

Screenplay by: Josh Singer

Produced by: Wyck Godfrey, p.g.a., Marty Bowen, p.g.a., Isaac Klausner, Damien Chazelle

Based on the Book by: James R. Hansen

Starring: Ryan Gosling, Claire Foy, Jason Clarke, Kyle Chandler, Corey Stoll, Patrick Fugit, Christopher Abbott, Ciaran Hinds, Olivia Hamilton, Pablo Schreiber, Shea Whigham, Lukas Haas, Ethan Embry, Brian D’Arcy James, Cory Michael Smith and Kris Swanberg.

Based on the biography written by James R. Hansen, ‘First Man: The Life of Neil A. Armstrong’, First Man allows the spectacular phenomenon of man landing on the moon to speak for itself.

Oscillating – yes, it gets technical which is the main reason I enjoyed the film – between the drama of Armstrong’s family life and his courage to risk everything to go to the moon, this is a quiet film punctuated by nail-biting suspense.

It would have been easy to over-dramatise the achievement of America being the first to step foot on alien ground, instead, director Damien Chazelle (La La Land (2016), Whiplash (2013)) focuses more on the man: his sacrifice, strength and will to achieve what the American government so desperately wants to achieve before the Russians.

Ryan Gosling as Armstrong holds up the helmet well as the family man and as the brave, cautious and deliberate pilot navigating rockets, that are really bombs, set off while strapped inside what looks like a tin can.

The absurdity and risks are shown with lines like the technician buckling Dave Scott (Christopher Abbott) in for the test run of rocketing Gemini 8 through the atmosphere to see if it’s possible to dock one craft to another in space asking, ‘Anybody got a Swiss army knife handy?’

‘You’re kidding?!’ Dave says as the final adjustments are made.

First Man is about the years it took to accomplish the impossible, opening in 1961 with Neil beyond the atmosphere, testing the ability to cut through and be able to fall back to Earth – and the love of his wife Janet (Claire Foy), son (Gavin Warren / Luke Winters) and the devastating loss of his young daughter, Karen (Lucy Stafford).

This is a drama, the frailty of humanity given as much weight as the courage required to realise one of man’s greatest achievements.

When interviewed to join the Apollo team, Armstrong’s told by one interviewer that he’s sorry for the loss of his daughter.

To which he replies, ‘I’m sorry, is there a question?’

And he’s asked whether the loss has any effect on his wanting to join the Apollo mission.

‘It would be unreasonable to assume it wouldn’t have an effect.’

This statement sums up the movie for me – a quietly suspenseful and direct depiction of what it took and the motivation to drive someone to take such risks without unnecessary fanfare.

American Animals

Rated: MA15+American Animals

Directed and Written by: Bart Layton

Produced by: Katherine Butler, Mary Jane Skalski, Derrine Schlesinger, Dimitri Doganis

Director of Photography: Ole Bratt Birkeland

Editor: Nick Fenton

Starring: Evan Peters (Warren Lipka), Barry Keoghan (Spencer Reinhard), Jared Abrahamson (Eric Borsuk), Blake Jenner (Chas Allen II) and Ann Dowd (Betty Jean Gooch).

American Animals is a different kind of heist film that plays out in the style of a documentary shown like a suspense thriller.

The film’s based on the true story of four college students who decide to rob the Special Collections Library of Spencer’s College housing incredibly rare books including Audubon’s Birds of America valued at $10 million dollars.  In broad daylight.

Writer and award-winning director, Bart Layton (winning the BAFTA Award for Outstanding Debut for The Imposter) utilises the techniques of documentary by basing his script on interviews with the four robbers, Warren Lipka, Spencer Reinhard, Eric Borsuk and Charles “Chas” Allen II and their families and victim of the heist, librarian, Betty Jean Gooch.

He includes the interviews in the film, the facts and post-crime analysis, with the guys recounting each of their unique perspective alongside the dramatization of actors playing the parts, sometimes repeating immediately what was said by the real-life person.  Which could have been repetitious but instead added this interesting layer to the film that Layton uses to create something more than just a documentary or just another heist movie.

It was like putting distance between who the guys are now compared to the people who planned and ultimately committed the crime.

The fantasy of successfully pulling off a heist shown by actors added to the vision of how they saw themselves to cut to the reality of what they had actually done and how it felt, crossing a line that can never be uncrossed.

‘This is the History of Demolition’ says a poster on the wall of Spencer Reinhard.  It stuck with me as the fantasy of pulling off a heist in the middle of the day, to steal rare books worth millions, starts to get way too real.  It’s like watching Spencer’s life fall apart.

There’s a scene when Warren and Spencer are talking about the planning in the early days, where Spencer is waiting for something to happen in his life to give it meaning, ‘Like what?’ Warren asks.

‘Exactly. Like what.’

It seems easy fun, the planning, travelling to New York to meet a Fence, the drawing of blue prints, the stake-outs where Eric, an accountant major, who plans to join the FBI, takes to the planning of the heist like a fish in water.

As Warren says, it’s a, Take the blue or red pill, moment.

It’s the adventure they’ve all been looking for.

And it makes for a great story like an Ocean’s film but with young guys in college, sussing it out like idiots looking up how to rob a bank on Google.

And there’s thought into the way the shots are taken, the opening up-side-down, the cutting from character to real person; a face in front of a computer seen behind the text on screen.

Yet more than the clever cutting of imagery, the matching of each actor to each part was uncanny, and a successful technique because the splicing between the real and the drama works on a completely different level.  Which also says something for the actors such as the familiar faces of Evan Peters (I’m fast becoming a fan and may have a crush) and Barry Keoghan, another one to watch and last seen in his disturbing performance in, The Killing of a Sacred Deer.

The film is a solid package that has a cool soundtrack (The Doors, ‘Peacefrog’ for example), is visually creative and has a fascinating story, with suspense, humour, intrigue, adventure while also showing the toll taken when crossing the line from fantasy to stark reality.

Sicario: Day of the Soldado

Rated: MA15+Sicario: Day of the Soldado

Directed by: Stefano Sollima

Written by / Based on Characters Created by: Taylor Sheridan

Produced by: Basil Iwanyk, Edward L. Mcdonnell, Molly Smith, Thad Luckinbill, Trent Luckinbill

Music by: Hildur Guđnadóttir

Starring: Benicio Del Toro, Josh Brolin, Isabela Moner, Jeffrey Donovan, Manuel Garcia-Rulfo, Catherine Keener.

The word Sicario comes from the zealots of Jerusalem.  Killers who hunted the Romans who invaded their homeland.  In Mexico, Sicario means hitman (Sicario, 2015).

Sicario: Day of the Soldado brings the same grit as the previous instalment with Alejandro (Benicio Del Toro) returning to take revenge on the cartel who killed his wife and daughter; this time CIA operative Matt Graver (Josh Brolin) needs the assassin’s special set of skills to kidnap the daughter of a cartel kingpin to start a war.  Because now the American Government has declared the cartels as terrorists.

Returning from the Middle East it’s a tactic Matt Graver has used before: take down a king, you solve problems; you make peace.  Take down a prince (or here, princess), you create chaos.

Writer, Taylor Sheridan has brought back many familiar faces, developing the characters further with the exception of FBI Critical Incident Response Group Agent, Kate Macer (Emily Blunt).

Emily Blunt in the original was such a significant piece, the entire film circling her role as, the agent used by forces above her pay-grade, that I wondered how a sequel could have the same impact without her.

Yet, the shear gravitational pull of Benicio Del Toro as Alejandro and Josh Brolin as Matt Graver grab your attention, the undercurrent of force from these bad-guys, now shown to be the ones used by the government for supposed good, are further revealed as the story takes a dark road filled with soldiers from both sides of the boarder fighting their own battles – some newly recruited Coyotes where the money’s in the shepherding of migrants from Mexico to America, more money made from human trafficking than drugs; to the kidnapped daughter of a cartel kingpin, Isabela Reyes (Isabela Moner): sixteen-years-old, queen of her universe and willing to scratch and defend her own pride until the reality of her father’s business is revealed; her kidnappers the only ones she can trust.

It’s a story that keeps developing, like the previous Sicario.  And the tone is similar; yet there’s a more dramatic, emotional undertone as the innocence of the young girl Isabela reminds Alejandro of his daughter and reminds Matt of his humanity.

Sicario: Day of the Soldado

Italian director, Stefano Sollima (Gomorrah, Romanzo Criminale, A.C.A.B.: All Cops Are Bastards and Suburra) certainly had big shoes to fill after director, Denis Villeneuve absolutely nailed, Sicario (2015) (which I gave five stars, see review here).

I’m talking steal-caps not the open-toed numbers worn by Matt – here in Crocs (showing much more about this character than words just by his choice of footwear: brilliant).

And Sollima has succeeded in creating a film similar in tone but slightly different, exploring a more emotional landscape demonstrated so well in the soundtrack.

After the recent passing of composer, Jóhann Johannsson (composer of Sicario and the film here dedicated to his memory), his protégé and collaborative partner, Hildur Guđnadóttir was tasked with composing the soundtrack for Soldado.

Again, we have a similar sound with Guđnadóttir mirroring the same restraint; orchestral touches here and there and references to ‘The Beast’ – with downward bass glissandos and distorted drums.

The droning of that identifiable sound of foreboding doom would have been a temptation for over-use.  But there’s control, like the quiet power and force of Alejandro, the man instantly recognisable by the way he holds himself, by the quiet swagger of his walk.  And it’s the restraint that creates the edge-of-your-seat suspense.

There’s gun shots and blood and explosions but not gratuitous violence because that would take away from the detail of the story.

And devices like raids viewed through the night-vision goggles of soldiers soften the violence, the grainy green of blood splatter more like watching a computer game than people being shot and killed.

So thankfully for us, the audience, we get a sequel that keeps the brilliance of the first film continuing with a new and interesting story.

Some of the Villeneuve poetry is missing.  Even with those wide-len’s shots of a lonely desert still seem to miss the expanse of his eye.  And I didn’t relate to young Isabela Reyes like the force that was Emily Blunt as Kate Macer.

Yet with my expectations set to a such a high level, I was not disappointed.

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