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All shock, no awe

When Emily Blunt opted to make A Quiet Place, or the new Mary Poppins movie, or whatever it was that kept her from saying, “Sure, why not?” to a Sicario sequel, that’s when producers should’ve just said, “Oh, well. Maybe later, when Blunt frees up?” After all, she was the main reason to watch the original.

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Nope, they went for it anyway, and the result is Sicario: Day of the Soldado, an excuse to trot out Benicio Del Toro and Josh Brolin for a nasty film plotted in such a way as to assure it would give the likes of Sean Hannity a monster boner—a ginormous, Fox News red boner right there in the middle of the theater.

The timing of this movie is, shall we say, interesting. As real-life tensions build along the Mexican border, with families being separated and humanitarian water jugs being poured out, along comes a movie that shows ISIS terrorists crossing over the Mexican border and blowing up strip malls. Wait a minute, isn’t Sicario supposed to be about America’s beef with drug cartels? This ISIS stuff feels, well, tacked on.

While the terrorism element introduced near the beginning of the movie looks to be the driving force of the plot early on, it all but falls away in favor of a subplot about a kidnapping intended to start a war between the Mexican and U.S. governments. In fact, a character dismisses the terrorist element later in the movie by saying “Oh, they were from New Jersey,” or something along those lines. It’s as if screenwriter Taylor Sheridan started one movie, got scared, said screw it, and finished with another one. To say the movie lacks focus is an understatement.

Brolin returns as agent Matt Graver, a nasty guy who will blow up your brother as you watch on a laptop if you don’t tell him what he needs to hear. Del Toro is also back as Alejandro, an operative once again hired by the U.S., this time to stir up trouble with the cartels and eventually kidnap Isabel (Isabela Moner), a drug kingpin’s daughter.

Let me just take this moment to say Moner, who you might remember from her unfortunate participation in the latest Transformers movie, is a big star in the making. She gives the kind of performance that breaks your heart because it is something so good in service of something so mediocre. There are moments when she makes you forget you’re watching a very unimportant movie.

Del Toro works hard to bring some gravitas to the proceedings, but this is basically a sadistic action thriller with little brains. There are some decent sequences put together by director Stefano Sollima, who replaces the excellent Denis Villeneuve from the original. While Villeneuve could provide real dramatic heft with the gunfights, Sollima gives us the shocks minus the depth. It’s a hollow movie.

Catherine Keener shows up as Brolin’s boss, required to make him do things that only a truly despicable POTUS would put into play. It’s hard to tell if the movie is an indictment of U.S. policies, or a celebration, although the dude whooping and drooling in the front row makes me think it could be taken as the latter. Matthew Modine is on hand as the Secretary of Defense, and plays it like a beefier meditation on his Stranger Things villain.

Sicario: Day of the Soldado avoids being one of the summer’s worst thanks to Moner, who makes stretches of the movie worthwhile. She’s slated to possibly play the title character in the live action Dora the Explorer. Whatever she does, she will probably wind up a star. As for the Sicario franchise? It’ll probably have a place for now, being that it basically amounts to Trump porn, intended or not. Ω

“You guys remember Traffic? That was a good movie.”

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4American Animals Here’s a heist movie based on a true story with an original twist. Writerdirector Bart Layton has made a narrative film based on a real-life robbery of some treasured collectibles by four young men. Layton casts the four with the great talents of Evan Peters, Blake Jenner, Barry Keoghan and Jared Abrahamson for an exciting and funny retelling of the heist, which had some normal guys dressing like old men to steal paintings and Darwin books from a kindly librarian (Ann Dowd). The twist here is that Layton also gets the real-life people to tell their accounts of what actually happened, so he mixes in a true documentary element. But rather than playing like some campy criminal reenactment TV show, the film comes together in a way where the real guys are right at home in the proceedings. It’s a genius move that gives the movie some real-life heft without taking away from the drama and craziness of the crime. In fact, their presence truly enhances everything, making this one of the more unique crime films in memory. Peters is terrific as Warren Lipka, the bad boy mastermind of the group (and Lipka himself makes for an entertaining counterpart in his interview segments). Jenner continues to be a great up-and-coming actor, while Keoghan impressively adds to a resume that includes Dunkirk and The Killing of the Sacred Deer. One of the movie’s great elements is the differences between the storytelling and the actual interviews, something that Layton comically exploits on more than one occasion.

4Avengers: Infinity War The Avengers team takes a swift kick to their remarkably muscular collective ass via a super baddie named Thanos in Avengers: Infinity War, likely the best big blockbuster time you will have at the cinemas this summer. The last “Avengers” movie, Avengers: Age of Ultron, was a misguided, boring dud. This third installment—the first of a two-parter—lets it all hang out with a massive collection of characters and a scary sense of impending doom. There are many, many storylines at play servicing many superheroes and villains. Infinity War feels like the Magnolia of Marvel movies in that it takes all of those storylines and balances them in a cohesive, vastly entertaining manner. It’s over two-and-a-half hours long, but it’s never even close to boring. The balancing act is performed by directors Anthony and Joe Russo, the team that made Captain America: Civil War such a winner. The magic of that film carries over into this one, which picks up directly after the end of Thor: Ragnarok. That film ended with Thor and his fellow Asgardians feeling somewhat triumphant after losing their planet after defeating emo Cate Blanchett. A mid-credits scene saw their ship coming face to face with one owned by the mighty Thanos (Josh Brolin). In one of the great performance-capture achievements, Brolin is the best of monsters, one who manages just enough of a sensitive side that he falls well short of stereotype.

3Deadpool 2 The happily profane superhero party continues with Deadpool 2, a sequel that brings the anarchic spirit of the original without necessarily blazing any new trails. Ryan Reynolds, who has experienced a career explosion thanks to this franchise—and, of course, his undeniable talents—continues to break the fourth wall, Ferris Bueller style. While the gimmick definitely leads to some good laughs, it does get to a point that feels a little too cute and repetitive. He winks at the audience so much, he must have some severe eyelid muscle strains. He’s gonna have an eyeball pop out. The film starts with Deadpool dejectedly blowing himself up, complete with a severed arm giving the finger. Then it goes into flashback mode as Wade Wilson cleverly and smarmily tells us why he did such a thing. We also get a repeat of the “Wiseass Opening Credits” gag that got the original off to such a good start. This time, instead of Juice Newton’s “Angel of the Morning,” the credits roll to a brand new ballad from Celine Dion, so the stakes have definitely been raised. 3 Ideal Home Paul Rudd and Steve Coogan play a fighting gay couple forced to take on the Coogan character’s grandson in this ultimately enjoyable movie. It’s enjoyable because Rudd and Coogan take it above its silly sitcom tropes and provide genuine laughs and real emotion. Paul (Rudd) and Erasmus (Coogan) work on a cooking show together and live an upscale life. Angel (Jack Gore) shows up at their door after his dad gets busted, and the two must learn to be parents overnight. There are moments in this movie—registering the kid for school, visiting dad in jail—that feel like a thousand movies before it, and director Andrew Fleming throws in too many plugs for Taco Bell. Problems aside, Rudd and Coogan had me laughing consistently and loudly throughout the movie. This really is a movie that could’ve been awful, but they more than save it, to the point where it can actually be recommended. Gore doesn’t really stand out as the precocious kid, which slows things down at times, but Jake McDorman is hilarious in his few screen moments as the dad. Overall, this will most assuredly provide a good pile of chuckles, and sometimes that’s all a comedy really needs to do. (Available for rent on iTunes, Amazon and other streaming services during a limited theatrical release.)

4Incredibles 2 After a 14-year hiatus, the Parr family returns for more superhero shenanigans in Pixar’s Incredibles 2, a sequel that continues the zippy, funny spirit of the original. It’s not as good as the first, but it still finds a ranking near the top of Pixar’s best and is the company’s best sequel since Toy Story 3. The film picks up where the last one left off, with a criminal named Underminer (everpresent Pixar voice John Ratzenberger) looking to cause some early movie trouble and teen Violet Parr (Sarah Vowell, reprising her role, even though she’s well past her teens) meeting a boy. Superheroes remain somewhat in hiding, but rich tycoon Winston Deavor (Bob Odenkirk) is looking to change that. Winston hatches a plan to get superheroes back in the limelight, and that plan involves Elastigirl/Helen (Holly Hunter) on a crazy new motorbike fighting crime and gaining publicity. While she’s out getting her superhero groove back, Mr. Incredible/ Bob (Craig T. Nelson) must stay at home and take care of the kids, including Violet, Dash (Huck Milner) and baby Jack-Jack (Eli Fucile).

1Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom This is a big dummy dino joke of a movie. It’s nothing but a brainless, sloppy rehash of Steven Spielberg’s original Jurassic Park sequel, The Lost World, with a lame militaristic angle thrown in (again!). Yes, the dinosaurs look cool, and things get off to an awesome start with an underwater visit to the skeleton of the genetically engineered dinosaur, Indominus Rex, that died hard at the end of Jurassic World. The prologue is scary, looks great, is well directed, and seems to be setting the tone for a film that recalls the grim tone of Michael Crichton’s original. Sadly, things degenerate badly after the title credits pop up. When a volcanic eruption on the isle of dinosaurs threatens their genetically engineered lives, Congress holds hearings on whether or not to save them. These hearings involve the return of the one and only Jeff Goldblum as Dr. Ian Malcolm. Rather than having Goldblum around for his trademark psycho rambling and dark wit, his character just groans a couple of lines about how we shouldn’t have made the dinosaurs because it goes against nature and they have really big teeth and might bite you. Then he goes away. Owen (Chris Pratt) and Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard) return to the island to save Blue, the adorable velociraptor who wants you to pet him. Eventually, the action winds up in a large mansion in the states, where a nefarious businessman is keeping dinosaurs in the basement in order to auction them off in what amounts to a dinosaur fashion show for evil countries who want to weaponize them.

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