Movies Like Sicario

Frequently asked about Sicario

Common questions people search for, with answers written by us at MoviesPack.

• Who is Alejandro, and what is his true mission in the film?▾

  Alejandro Gillick (Benicio del Toro) is a former Mexican prosecutor whose wife and daughter were murdered by the cartel boss Fausto Alarcon. He is working for the CIA-backed operation not as a government agent but as a cartel hitman — a 'sicario' — hired to assassinate Alarcon and destabilize the Sonora cartel. His entire involvement in the task force is a means to gain access to Alarcon so he can personally kill him in revenge.

• Why does Alejandro force Kate to sign the document at gunpoint at the end?▾

  After killing Alarcon and his family, Alejandro returns to Kate's apartment and forces her at gunpoint to sign a document declaring that the operation was lawful and conducted by the book. This protects the CIA and the task force from legal liability by establishing an official paper trail. It also makes Kate complicit in the operation she has been morally resisting throughout the film, stripping away her last illusion of ethical detachment.

• What does Kate's role in the operation actually turn out to be?▾

  Kate (Emily Blunt) is recruited by the task force specifically because she is a documented, credentialed law enforcement officer — her presence gives the operation a veneer of legal authority under U.S. law. As Graver (Josh Brolin) explains near the end, she was never a decision-maker; she was legal cover. The task force needed a 'clean' agent attached to justify their cross-border actions, and Kate fulfilled that bureaucratic function without being told the real objective.

• What is the significance of the tunnel raid sequence and why does the team enter Mexico?▾

  The tunnel raid is the operational climax where the task force crosses the U.S.-Mexico border through a cartel tunnel to intercept a money shipment tied to Alarcon's network. By tracing the cash flow back through the tunnel and its handlers, Alejandro acquires the intelligence needed to locate Alarcon himself. The sequence also underscores the film's central theme: U.S. agencies are conducting extralegal operations inside Mexico with no official authorization, doing things in the shadows that would be impossible through legitimate channels.

• Why does Alejandro spare Kate's life but kill everyone else connected to the cartel?▾

  Alejandro tells Kate directly: 'You should move to a small town, somewhere the rule of law still exists.' He spares her because she is not part of the cartel world and poses no ongoing threat to his mission — she is simply an inconvenient witness. His mercy toward her also contrasts sharply with his methodical killing of Alarcon's wife and children at the dinner table, illustrating that Alejandro operates by his own moral logic of targeted revenge rather than indiscriminate violence.