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Nice review of an excellent movie.

Jewish zealots used daggers hidden in cloaks to kill their oppressors and were thus dubbed in Latin…”Sicarious”…or dagger men.

I wonder if that's where Judas Iscariot got his moniker. He was a zealot as well.

A very excellent movie. I've been thinking about the premise raised of supporting one horrible gang (in this case, the Medellin Colombians) to bring some semblance of order into the sea of chaos brought about by the Mexican cartels. It's an evil choice, but as stated in the movie ...as long as 20% of the US is willing to continue buying drugs, it may be the only solution (paraphrased).

Which makes sense since I've always believed that the solution to the drug war (one that doesn't involve losing, as is currently the case) is to focus on demand rather than supply. The current drug war focuses on supply ...meaning locking up the drug dealers and other peddlers, and every now and then, when lucky, someone who actually matters. Although, usually, they only get the street corner thug with a couple of rocks or the pimply faced meth cooker. A waste of time since the overhang of demand to supply simply means that person is almost instantly replaced.

Focusing on supply has been a waste of time. The drugs coming in keep getting (1) purer, (2) cheaper and (3) plentier. Using simple metrics, the war on drugs has failed.

Now, focusing on demand would change the game. If you take supply out, the presence of demand dictates that new supply will come on line. However, if you take demand out (eg giving users that are caught the same sentences given to sellers), then without demand the supply has nowhere to go. The influence of demand on supply is greater than the influence of supply to demand.

However, that will never happen. It makes too much sense, and is also too close to what people would see as fascist (people see no problem locking up the drug dealer or the prostitute for years on end, but start locking up the 18 year old user or the 45 year old married John and suddenly people are up in arms).

So, since that is not an option, then the advocacy made in the film makes sense. Pick a monster you can control, use it to kill the other monsters, and that way you only have one beast to try and somewhat control, rather than a hydra that is rabid and amorphous.

Too bad Emily Blunt shot her mouth off, now I won’t waste my time or money.