Sicario defies female stereotypes in movies

When I first saw the movie posters for Denis Villeneuve’s Sicario plastered around Los Angeles, I found myself completely disinterested. At the foreground of the poster stands a stern Emily Blunt, arms raised, finger on the trigger of a gun. Behind her, Benicio Del Toro and Josh Brolin are poised, ready for action, moving toward her as if in support of whatever she’s about to do.

I was un-enthralled for two reasons. I didn’t truly believe -—from the perspective of my own gender-biases — that the movie could be centered around Blunt. I also felt the film was bound to just be some testosterone-fueled action movie with little to no heart involved. It had potential to be intense and fast-paced. But could it be interesting and transformative? No way.

But I was wrong. Without giving too much away, I felt it was important to examine Blunt’s character in what is now officially my favorite film of the year.

The topic of female protagonists in naturally male “gritty” environments has been on my mind a lot. This semester I enrolled in the “The Gangster and American Culture” class, and we have studied just how much the woman is relegated to background characters and shut out from the man’s “business.” In the final shot of The Godfather, we see Michael Corleone close the door to his office in his wife’s face, effectively shutting her completely out of his business and determining that the space was no place for a woman. Over the course of Mad Men, the audience watches as females struggle to assert themselves in the male-dominated ad space. In The Sopranos, Tony Soprano keeps his wife in the dark about his sordid and violent life outside their suburban home. Time and time again, it’s clear that women are not allowed in these worlds inhabited entirely of men.

And then, along comes Sicario, where Blunt’s Kate Macer is not only one of three primary characters, but is also the main avenue by which we learn information about the world around us. Kate is a tough FBI agent who’s specially chosen to work with Matt Graver (Josh Brolin) and Alejandro Gillick (Benicio Del Toro) in a task force fighting the war on drugs. Throughout the film, she continually challenges the seemingly illegal ways in which the task force is handling the job. She questions and demands and prods, and though the men fail to provide straightforward answers, she’s driven by a deeper desire to end the horrifying realities of the drug cartels rather than abandoning the project in favor of morals. Ultimately, she finds herself disheartened with the actions of the task force, but for the majority of the film she continues to seek justice over ethics, and we immerse ourselves the story as she continues.

In a conversation with one of my film school professors last week, we discussed whether Emily Blunt could be seen as a passive character (who has action happen to her) or an active character (who drives the plot). My professor pointed out that if the filmmakers had removed her from the story, the men in the film would’ve pretty much done the same things. By making Macer the lens through which we see the film, we are provided with a sympathetic way of viewing a film that would otherwise be too horrifying and violent for some people to digest. Blunt’s character is a respite for which we can rest our desensitized minds. We question morality along with her, and we’re allowed to see alternate perspectives instead of being bombarded with the manliness and overtly testosterone-fueled story line.

The vital need for Blunt’s character in Sicario becomes especially apparent with Netflix’s recently released new series Narcos — which also centers on the war on drugs. In Narcos, women are once again relegated to background players removed from the business of men. They’re set pieces and play things, not taken seriously or integral to the plot. In light of this, Kate becomes even more important, simply by the fact that she’s there and refuses to give up — no matter how many times the men keep her in the dark.

Of course, that isn’t to say the film isn’t problematic, but it ultimately demonstrates the radical way in which films may reframe and reimagine the stereotypically male spheres that exist in violent action and mobster genres. Perhaps in years to come, we will gain a perspective on how the film plays into the ultimate scheme of things, and Sicario will appear on cinema studies syllabi as a film that contributed to a dialogue in a positive, and perhaps revolutionary, way.

Minnie Schedeen is a junior majoring in cinematic arts and critical studies. Her column, “Film Fatale,” runs every Tuesday.