I found myself liking this

Watched this on several friends' recommendations.

Starting with the negative, it's a pretty cookie-cutter story about black ops on Mexican narcos, with out-of-the-box, ready-to-wear characters.

Then again, the actors manage to salvage their paper-thin alter egos. Del Toro and Brolin are excellent as usual, in their favourite register, as usual.
Blunt always brings commitment to her work (from what I've seen), and sells her Clarice Starling rather convincingly. And she's easy to look at. Not the most sugary of eye candies, but she does it for me. Probably not being objective here.

The script is unsurprising, but tightly focused and well paced. I have reservations regarding Villeneuve, but he does know how to tell a story.

What really surprised me, though, was the insane visual quality. Until I checked, and identified the director of photography as Sir Roger Deakins, Knight Bachelor of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire. Check him out, the bloke's got legit bragging rights.


As for wokeness, well, bad is bad, morals are grey for they who stare into the abyss, and the boss babe trope is completely avoided: Blunt's character gets manhandled by the bigger fellows around her, as expected given her small frame, and her character's lack of sheer malevolence.


All in all, not a fantastic movie, but a smashing watch.