A nihilistic nothingburger

Rating: 4/10 (8 January 2016)

If you can take your lead character out of a movie without affecting any of the events, you've got a problem. Emily Blunt is there to observe events, but does not affect them in any significant way. Plus I couldn't get over the absurdity of the plot:

Worried about an ambush at the backed-up border? Have you heard of airplanes or helicopters?

No back history or real home life shown for any of the characters, and there's nobody to root for, really. Del Toro's character is a monster of a hit-man who kills children just to make a point. And after what this country has done in real life, are we really still showing the "heroes" successfully getting information out of a prisoner via water torture?

Speaking of which, why stage the tunnel raid just to get him into Mexico, when he could plainly just drive in? What if the corrupt policeman's car hadn't been at the tunnel entrance? Would he have hailed a cab? Why did the cop keep unloading drugs after they heard gunfire in the tunnel?

The movie revels in gore without a point, such as the headless bodies hanging from a Juarez overpass which we are shown no less than four times. Although visually well made, the movie exists in a moral vacuum with no hope and no virtue.