By Susan Granger
Special to WestportNow
There’s no Emily Blunt as the FBI agent who served as the conscience of the 2015 original, so the “Sicario: Day of the Soldado” sequel comes across as amoral, ultraviolent and, unfortunately, all too timely, given the ‘zero-tolerance’ escalation of U.S. immigration crisis.
Indeed, it begins as illegal Mexican immigrants are attempting to cross into the United States. When the Border Patrol stops one of the refugees at gunpoint, he blows himself up, detonating an explosive vest.
Cut to ISIS terrorists exploding a store in Kansas City, Missouri, while a mother pleads for the life of her child.
Josh Brolin reprises his role as compromised CIA operative Matt Graver, taking cues from his handler Cynthia Foards (Catherine Keener) and the secretary of defense (Matthew Modine), who notes, “The president is adding drug cartels to the list of terrorist organizations.”
Back too is Benicio Del Toro as enigmatic Alejandro Gillick, Matt’s secret ops ally who is after the ‘bad hombres’ who smuggle Islamic terrorists across the border.
They come up with a misguided plan to “kidnap” and “rescue” Isabella Reyes (Isabela Moner), a cartel kingpin’s bratty daughter to incite a war between two Mexican drug syndicates. But the plan backfires when her father seems willing to sacrifice the troublesome teenager as collateral damage.
That leaves vengeful Alejandro in the desert, torn between the CIA’s order to eliminate the girl and his deepest paternal instincts.
Plus, there’s a subplot involving Miguel Hernandez (Elijah Rodriguez), a Mexican-American youth with relatives on both sides of the border, who joins a gang of human traffickers.
Sketchily scripted by Taylor Sheridan and helmed by Italian TV director Stefano Sollima, it tries to mask the misguided, muddled, double-crossing storytelling with amped up action.
FYI: While the word “soldado” means soldier, it also incorporates the word “dad.”
On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Sicario: Day of the Soldado” is a somber, savage 6, as sinister and intense as the nightly news from McAllen, Texas.
Five-time NBA All-Star Kyrie Irving comes to the rescue in “Uncle Drew,” an amusing senior citizen comedy, spinning off viral Pepsi ads in which the Boston Celtics point guard plays a grumpy old codger.
The set-up introduces basketball fanatic Dax (Lil Rey Howery), who has always wanted the neighborhood team that he coaches to win the $100,000 cash prize in Harlem’s ‘Rucker Classic’ tournament.
But then his longtime rival, Mookie (Nick Kroll), not only poaches his street ball squad but also his materialistic girlfriend, Jess (Tiffany Haddish).
Having spent his life savings on the registration fee, Dax convinces legendary Uncle Drew (Irving) and his septuagenarian buddies — Big Fella (Shaquille O’Neal), Preacher (Chris Webber), wheelchair-bound Boots (Nate Robinson) and legally-blind Lights (Reggie Miller) — to return to the court one last time.
(Not being basketball savvy, I had to trust to press notes to find out that it’s a kind of homage to real life street ball legend Earl Manigault.)
Needless to say, the seemingly decrepit, yet deceptively agile geezers outplay the ‘hippity-hoppity youngbloods,’ referring to the same quote as “Tag”: “You don’t stop playing because you get old, you get old because you stop playing.”
Produced by ESPN in partnership with Pepsi and Nike, flimsily scripted as a cliché-cluttered, underdog story by Jay Longino (“Skiptrace”) and unevenly directed by Charles Stone III (“Drumline”), it’s all about teamwork and taking risks to achieve your goals.
As Uncle Drew tells Dax: “You miss 100 percent of the shots you don’t take.”
Most memorable as the hero’s cautionary best-friend in “Get Out,” Lil Rey Howery once again draws on his comedic timing. And retired WNBA star Lisa Leslie appears as Preacher’s irate wife, Betty Lou.
On the Granger Gauge, “Uncle Drew” dunks a silly, sports-lovers 6, as the mature roster scores.
Ostensibly an entirely true story, “American Animals” follows four, upper middle class college students who, back in December, 2004, planned one of the most audacious art heists in U.S. history.
Hidden in the Special Collections Library at Transylvania College in Lexington, Kentucky, and guarded by dutiful librarian Betty Jean Gooch (Ann Dowd) are rare folios of John James Audubon’s “Birds of America” and a first edition of Charles Darwin’s “On the Origin of Species.”
They’re the targets of jittery, wannabe artist Spencer Reinhard (Barry Keoghan) and volatile, sociopathic Warren Lipka (Evan Peters), who enlist two other acquaintances — fitness fanatic Charles “Chas” Allen II (Blake Jenner) and accounting expert Eric Borsuk (Jared Abrahamson) — to join them in this theft.
Related from their multiple perspectives, including those of their older, wiser, real life counterparts and their bewildered parents, plus the hapless librarian, British writer/director Burt Layton meticulously reconstructs the entire operation — from its fanciful beginning to its ignominious conclusion.
After obtaining blueprints, they devise ways to circumvent the surveillance, clear an escape route thru the “staff only” elevator, obtain “elderly” disguises (which they eventually discard) and make elaborate plans about how to “fence” the stolen property after they make their getaway.
Much of this is inspired by “researching” Stanley Kubrick’s “The Killing,” along with “The Sting,” “The Thomas Crown Affair,” “Ocean’s Eleven,” “The Getaway,” “Snatch,” “Goodfellas” and “Reservoir Dogs.”
Harking back to his 2012 hybrid-documentary “The Impostor,” which fuses fact with fantasy, Burt Layton, collaborating with cinematographer Ole Bratt Birkeland and editor Nick Fenton, blurs memory with reality, often intercutting what may-or-may-not have actually happened, as their felony is viewed from hindsight.
“We did the robbery as a way to escape,” one admits. “I think we all knew that we wanted something different, and we had to break away from where we were living …”
On the Granger Gauge, “American Animals” is a shallow, if stylishly suspenseful 6, relating a criminal caper that goes awry.
(Editor’s Note: Westport resident Susan Granger grew up in Hollywood, studied journalism with Pierre Salinger at Mills College, and graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with highest honors in journalism. In addition to writing for newspapers and magazines, she has been on radio/television as an anchorwoman and movie/drama critic for many years. See her reviews at www.susangranger.com.)
