Friday Night Gunfights: the Sicario Bridge

The famous bridge scene from Sicario - starring Emily Blunt, Josh Brolin, and Benicio del Toro.
July 7, 2017  
|  16 Comments
Categories: Musings

This evening, boys and girls, we’ll be looking at the movie Sicario; more specifically, the gunfight that occurs during the extradition of a major Narco leader early in the movie on what we’ll call Sicario Bridge.

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Filming on The Bridge of the Americas Was Almost As Dangerous as What is Portrayed in the Film

Note – 6/29/18 now edited with the addition of a “Script to Screen” video below; those guys do great stuff.

If you haven’t seen the film, it’s a gritty story that chronicles some of the conflict on the southwest border. It also takes a surprisingly realistic look at some of the hardships faced by law enforcement trying to combat the impact on cartel activity on American cities. It’s an excellent (albeit fictional) examination of the complicated issues that surround trans-national crime between two countries with a porous border. It’s also not for the faint of stomach.

OVERVIEW

The scene in question involves a convoy of US Law Enforcement (and “other”) personnel extraditing a high-ranking cartel member from Juarez back to El Paso. The movement is done via ground convoy, which is a risky move for exactly the reasons that unfold in the clip. Border crossings are natural choke points and create the potential for exactly what you see here — among other troubles of course.

 

 

HIGHLIGHTS

0:56 – Windows down for unobstructed lines of fire and maybe better audio awareness

1:45 – Unlock the doors to prevent yourself from getting hung up during a bail-out

2:36 – Overhead shot of the bailout looks smooth, except that everyone immediately went to the driver’s side and closed with the threat. With high value cargo still on board, it might have been smarter to keep a few shooters in static perimeter around the convoy, in case there are other threat vehicles that haven’t been spotted yet.

3:43 – Somebody DID stay with the prisoner, which is better than leaving him strapped in alone.

3:57 – Having tail gunners or “trunk monkeys” with muzzles out of your rearmost vehicle to cover movement off the X.

 

THE GOOD

Inclusion of less-than-sexy planning details like integration of air support and clarifying the ROE. There was excellent communication among the team, both between passengers in a vehicle, and between vehicles in the convoy. Constant cross-talk and “echoing” of called threats decreases reaction time and increases everyone’s situational awareness. Communication was also very realistic in how low-key it was. Lots of movies love to ramp up the drama by having everyone yell and whip their heads around like its total chaos. What you see here is far more true-to-life, at least in my experience, in its level of cool-headedness.

 

THE BAD

Soft-skinned vehicles for an HVT move? Probably not the wisest move unless it’s a situation where you’re going low profile, what Commonwealth shooters call “in mufti.” Up-armored Suburbans may have decreased the likelihood of having to “break seal” and trade bullets in broad daylight. Ideally, you’d want to try and coordinate with CBP and have them shut down one or two lanes of traffic that morning. Convoy rolls up, the drivers flash creds, CBP moves a couple cones and our good guys fly through the choke point at full speed via empty lanes. A direct air move would have been even better. Either way, sometimes speed is its own security.

Grunts: in mufti.

THE UGLY

Sometimes there’s no way to avoid choke points on the road. Traffic jams, one-way streets, busy stop-lights. Remember contextual relevance. Learn the phrase “what right looks like” and keep it in mind while on your route. Are 4 dudes with neck tats in a slammed coupe normal in your neighborhood? Is that pan-handler at that one stoplight there all the time, or did he just show up a few days ago? Does he look at you every time you stop at that light? Be aware of your surroundings and have a plan to get out.

The best fight in the world is the one you just avoided.

For the Purists — ZEROING IT IN

Overall, the fighting in this movie was far more realistic than the usual Hollywood nonsense. There are a number of issues, of course. Anyone can pick a scene apart with the luxury of pause, but we think they did a pretty good job with it. Some things our crew noticed:

• Did Benicio del Toro flag Kate Macer (Emily Blunt) at the beginning as he rotated around (and would he care)?

• Is that a bolt locked to the rear in the front passenger seat before they bail out of the vic?

• Why didn’t they smoke home-diggety-cartel-thug with the pistol and the constipated expression (from the red car) sooner?

• Is she pointing a handgun at the team’s back even though she can’t get in the fight?

• Why aren’t at least some of the nearby civilians jumping out of their cars and hauling ass?

• So…they get in a big gunfight and just roll out? If they’re in Mexico like that legally, would they actually boogie on across the border?

• Why did Alejandro (Benecio del Toro) use a 4th Gen Glock 17 in the warehouse, then switch to a suppressed H&K Mk 23 during the climax?

• How come Alejandro’s MP5A3 morphs into an MP5SD3?

• Why does Matt (Josh Brolin) get to use a Daniel Defense DDM4 with an EOTech when Kate has to use an M4A1?  That’s some bullshit.

• Did the SWAT sniper on overwatch during the opening scene have a Ballistic Advantage barrel in his Remington 700 PSS? If not, why not? And just why was he wearing all black, anyway?

What did we miss? Let us know in the comments section. TTPs, equipment, whatever. We’re geardos and gunnerds to the Nth degree. We could talk about this all day.

If you wanna see some more, check out the work one of our guys is doing over at the Internet Movie Firearms Database.

TM


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16 Comments

  1. Pete

    Taking off the helmets in the tunnel rather than just popping off the rhino and putting it in a pouch was pretty asinine. Hollywood has come a long way in gun handling, but the actors, writers, props people, stunt guys, and AD teams still generally have no real life experience with this stuff so it is inevitable that you get some stupid shit.

    Reply
    • Justin Thomas

      Lolol. Love the “purest” section of this article. One thing I noticed you missed, which is the first thing I noticed in the movie. In the beginning She enters the room and didn’t “pie the room”, hence why she nearly gets her head blown off with that shotgun.

      Reply
  2. Patrick Heilig

    Very entertaining segment. Keep it up1

    Reply
  3. Steve

    Another reason to like the movie–in several scenes the 120lb. Hollywood Supergrrl realistically gets her ass handed to her very quickly in physical confrontations with larger, stronger and more powerful men. That completely contradicts the typical narrative, and is refreshing.

    Reply
  4. Beerhawk

    Entertaining and educational. More, please. I hope to see a Triple 9 review.

    Reply
  5. JR

    Hey, I love this idea for a series. It’s cool to hear from the group of people who’ve btdt what they think, especially what is “good”.

    Reply
  6. Fiveinaline

    Just thought of something else….

    “• Why aren’t at least some of the nearby civilians jumping out of their cars and hauling ass?”

    I think the absence of panicking bystanders was intentional, to show how frequent shootouts in the streets have become in that region. The comment is made right at the end of the clip that the incident won’t even make the local papers.

    Reply
  7. Fiveinaline

    “Why does Matt (Josh Brolin) get to use a Daniel Defense DDM4 with an EOTech when Kate has to use an M4A1? That’s some bullshit.”

    She’s Bureau and he’s Agency. . . I guess the CIA get’s a bigger slice of our tax dollars…

    Reply
  8. Bblack

    Good movie. Garbage to judge tactics. It’s a movie.

    Reply
  9. OkieRIm

    I did have a comment posted on Friday, 07 July 2017 detailing that this movie has a sequel coming out, why did that get deleted?

    Reply
  10. Andrew

    For the 2:36 bailout overview. It looked like some of the guys went north and south not just west, initially at least. In the next aerial view it doesn’t show a perimeter that those north south guys would have set.

    Reply
  11. Matt

    I liked it keep it up it’s at the very least a good review and a good review is always good.

    Reply
  12. jbgleason

    Why does Matt (Josh Brolin) get to use a Daniel Defense DDM4 with an EOTech when Kate has to use an M4A1? That’s some bullshit.

    DD actually covered this recently in a write up their Marketing folks put out. The Director wanted Brolin to stand out as the TL and one of the ways they wanted to make that visually obvious was by giving him an upgraded weapon.

    I thought the overall scene was VERY WELL done for a Hollywood film. You have to remember that being correct is completely secondary to how good something looks on screen. As related by a buddy (SEAL) who was a Technical Director for a famous military movie – “The first time I saw them fucking up in a scene (full-auto fire in a hostage rescue scenario), I stepped in and told the Director that it was incorrect and that we would be taking semi auto controlled shots in that situation. He paused, looked at me for a second and said – Do you like what we are paying you? Then stand over there and be quiet, we will let you know when we have a question.”

    Reply
  13. Blake

    Diggin’ this article, hope the series continues.

    1. Josh Brolin rocking a Condor plate carrier? Mild misfit when you’ve got the Daniel Defense M4 and EOTech.

    2. Delta guy using a Disspator carbine during this gunfight. What is this, 1998?

    Reply
  14. JG

    Absolutely continue.

    Reply
  15. OkieRim

    Pretty good flick, think I have watched it abt 3 times. I think you hit all the good and bad points about this thing.

    The sequel (Soldado) is coming out sometime and thankfully Kate Macer (Emily Blunt) is not in it. She pissed me off in the USMS brief, on the bridge, and in the tunnel…pretty much the whole movie.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soldado

    http://www.imdb.com/title/tt5052474/

    Reply

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