I love examples of the American dream in real life. C-More red dot sights are an example of the American dream. Ira Kay was a dentist who enjoyed shooting USPSA, but his aging eyesight was making it harder and harder to compete. He looked into red dot optics and wasn’t satisfied, so he decided to build his own. Legend has it that the first few prototypes were developed in his dental office.
These optics became fairly popular and were some of the first red dot sights designed specifically for handguns. They went on to gain some small military orders, and C-More would later develop the M26 MASS, which would be adopted and utilized by the US Army. C-More also had some massive success in Hollywood. In fact, it’s basically the Desert Eagle of optics.
C-More Sights – Hollywood’s Favorite
I use the Desert Eagle as the example because it has well over 600 film credits to its name. Much like the Desert Eagle, the C-More seemingly pops up in action movies left and right. Movies like Mr. and Mrs. Smith, The Expendables, No Time to Die, xXx, Transformers, and even the upcoming Mission Impossible Dead Reckoning. It’s an optic that’s everywhere, all the time.
Why? Does C-More just mail these things to actors and hope they pop up in film? No, and to answer the question, we have to go back to the later 1980s and early 1990s. Throughout the 1980s, action movies were crazy and over the top. Movies like Predator, Commando, Rambo 3 and 4, Cobra, and so many more ruled the box office.
As the 80s ended, things got a bit grittier, and there was more of a focus on realism. 90s action movies were grunge, and 80s action movies were hair metal. The 1990s is when we saw the end of hip fire. Firing from the hip has been a Hollywood trope for decades, from the Dirty Dozen to Commando, it was just how action heroes used guns.
By the end of the 80s, and with the creep of the realism bug, our action heroes began to aim their weapons. As the 1990s faded into the 2000s, iron sights were on the outs. If you had a super commando action hero, iron sights just wouldn’t do.
Pretty Faces and Open Spaces
What optic does your hero use? In the early 2000s, the options were a little more limited, and they were often rather large. A big optic doesn’t work for a visual medium because it takes up too much of the screen. Plus, for those dramatic close-ups, you lose the view of your actor’s face.
If you are paying Angelina Jolie money, you don’t want an ACOG to cover half of her face. It’s tough to follow the characters if half their face is covered by a COMP M3. What can you do? That’s where C-More comes into place. The C-More sight is very minimalist, and while it’s clearly an optic, it doesn’t take up much of the screen and doesn’t block your character’s face.
It’s perfect for playing into a visual medium. These days, we have lots of optic options, including smaller red dots. That can be mounted further forward to get them out of the way. Even so, the C-More red dot still pops up here and there and likely will keep popping up due to its legacy and availability in Hollywood armories.
