These weren't the hostages they were looking for. And there's A WHOLE LOT MORE.
It’s a movie about Mexican drug cartels. Of course there’s bound to be some Nightmare Fuel.
- The bloody, plastic-wrapped corpses in the walls during the opening scene. Made even worse when you realize just how many of them there are. Not that it's easy to tell, but a close-up on one of the corpses' face implies that the victim's tongue was cut out before they were wrapped in the plastic, leaving them to bleed/choke to death in suffocating agony. Have fun imagining that one.
- The mutilated victims of the cartel in Juarez. They've been hung up missing so many body parts it can be difficult to tell which way up they've been hung.
- The banner hanging next to the bodies is also chilling in its message: "Tienen lo que ce merezes zerso. Los estamos observando, culeros" [English: "They got what you deserve. We are watching, assholes."]
- Becomes far more disturbing when you realize that this happens on a daily basis in contemporary Mexico, with dismembered bodies dumped not just in gutters and alleys, but busy intersections, nightclubs, and even police stations. Oh, and the mass grave mentioned above? They're not uncommon. One found recently
was filled with more than 250 corpses.
- Kate nearly getting strangled by Reggie's friend who turned out to be a Corrupt Cop.
- Alejandro killing Fausto Alarcon's wife and children before his eyes. It's so nightmarish that you might feel sorry for Fausto of all people.
- The intense, unrelenting drone of the soundtrack.
- The torture of Guillermo by Alejandro. Alejandro enters the interrogation room with a jug of water, with the cartel man tied down to a chair. Then, Alejandro stands over Guillermo, and the Gory Discretion Shot to the drain in the room shows that the water isn't being used to torture him. Nothing Is Scarier indeed.
- The Delta guys seem laid-back and friendly at first: the team leader briefs his men like they're planning a potluck, and one of them takes Macer up to the roof to watch the gunfire in Juárez, just for kicks. But when Reggie tries to defend Macer and is subdued and restrained, the leader's taunt to him, "Just lie back, baby, and let it happen," is absolutely chilling: it sounds like it's not the first time he's used that line.
- You are a ideallistic cop, you get recruited to a badass task force... it turns out they are actually an insane Death Squad engaged in a plan to try and take over a cartel, and your only use to them was to be complicit in their treason so you now have to participate in covering up their activities.
