"Jack Reacher" - 2012 - movie review

A taut, intelligent whodoneit "Jack Reacher" is the most fun I've had at a Tom Cruise movie in years. Written and directed by Christopher McQuarrie the film plays to Cruise's strengths (good guy with a sprinkling of anti-hero in his DNA who's on a mission) and in doing so prevents him from becoming the kind of distraction to the story he all-too-often is.

That story begins with a horrific crime wherein a sniper sets up in a parking garage and rains bloodshed down upon the populace of a midwestern city. Evidence quickly comes to light that implicates a former army sniper and Iraq veteran and when police raid his home they find enough additional evidence that links him to the crime to send him to the chair. As they try to get a confession out of him however he scribbles 3 words that have everyone involved scratching their heads: Get Jack Reacher.

Reacher, as it turns out, is also an Iraq veteran only he was a military policeman and the man accused of being the sniper was someone Reacher had tried desperately to send to the firing squad for killing 4 Iraqis in cold blood. At first he doesn't understand why the suspect would ask for him since he's clearly not an ally. In time it's discovered that he wanted Reacher involved because he knew Reacher would do the kind of thorough investigation that the case required.

Reacher's ally is the suspect's attorney Helen played by Rosamund Pike. While there's nothing wrong with her performance per se her character did seem to spend an inordinate amount of time with ample bosoms heaving generously astride their tectonic cleft for all to see. Not that I'm complaining, though it did get me to wondering exactly which midwestern city it is where the female attorneys dress thusly. Anyway, Helen's only thought in hooking up with Reacher is to gather enough evidence that her client was unhinged that she can keep him off death row. As Reacher digs deeper though it becomes apparent that there is more going on here than either initially suspected. A lot more.

Jack Reacher contains two of the years more intriguing supporting performances. One by Robert Duvall and the second by, of all people, the great Werner Herzog who plays the Eastern European head of a shadowy construction firm that has a history of getting what it wants. Duvall has lost none of his spunk and Herzog's Zec is every bit as unsettling and foreboding a character as you'd expect Herzog himself to be in real life.

While there are times when Cruise's dialogue sets the eyes to rolling (and to be sure the notion of him as a master of hand to hand kickassery is pretty funny too) for the most part the story unfolds in smart and unpredictable ways and holds your attention right up to the end, where I halfway expected Commissioner Gordon to pop up and say "He gave us a sign!"

While the similarities to "Taken" are pretty obvious Jack Reacher manages to stand on its own, mostly due to its middle American setting, it's occassional humor, and its post Iraq War topicality. If you're in the mood for a good, solid thriller/mystery/action flick Jack Reacher won't let you down.