Dinesh Kamath's column on Hollywood movie 'Jack Reacher' that was published in Newsband

Jack Reacher (previously titled One Shot) is a 2012 American crime film. It is a adaptation of Lee Child's 2005 novel One Shot. Written and directed by Christopher McQuarrie, the film stars Tom Cruise as the title character. The film entered production in October 2011, and concluded in January 2012. It was filmed entirely on location in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

The movie has an interesting plot. After a sniper kills five people in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, police arrest a man named James Barr, a former army sharpshooter, who asks them to contact Jack Reacher, a drifter and former Army Military Police officer. Working as an investigator for Barr's defense attorney, Reacher unravels a case involving a hired killer and a Russian known only as the Zec.

The movie has Tom Cruise as Jack Reacher, Rosamund Pike as Helen Rodin, Richard Jenkins as Alex Rodin, David Oyelowo as Emerson, Werner Herzog as The Zec, Jai Courtney as Charlie, Vladimir Sizov as Vlad, Joseph Sikora as James Barr, Michael Raymond-James as Linsky, Alexia Fast as Sandy, Josh Helman as Jeb, Robert Duvall as Cash, James Martin Kelly as Rob Farrior and Nicole Forester as Nancy Holt.

In July 2011, Cruise was in negotiations to play the role of Jack Reacher. Author Lee Child said that it would be impossible to find a suitable actor to play the giant Reacher and to recreate the feel of the book onscreen, and that Cruise had the talent to make an effective Reacher. Child also said, "Reacher's size in the books is a metaphor for an unstoppable force, which Cruise portrays in his own way." Of Cruise's relatively small stature, Child said, "With another actor you might get 100% of the height but only 90% of Reacher. With Tom, you'll get 100% of Reacher with 90% of the height."

Cruise preformed all of his own driving stunts during the film's signature car chase sequence. "Action to me is something very fun to shoot. The challenge in most car chases is you're trying to hide the fact that it's not the actor driving," McQuarrie said. "The challenge here was the exact opposite. We were trying to find a way to show that it was always Tom driving. He's literally driving in every stunt sequence."

The film includes a scene in which a sniper guns down what looks to be five random targets on a riverfront promenade. Writer-director McQuarrie endorsed the decision, saying he and Cruise "insisted upon it. Nobody should be celebrating anything 24 hours after a tragic event like that. We thought long and hard about it. This was not a snap judgment, because we wanted to give back to the city of Pittsburgh [by having the premiere there], because they were so great to us."

There are 63% of 115 film critics who have given the film a positive review, with a rating average of 6.2 out of 10.

This entry, undoubtedly expected to inspire sequels, is based on the novel One Shot. A killer coolly shoots several innocent citizens in a public square, and then demands to see Reacher once he’s caught.

A fiercely independent Army veteran who served in Iraq with the gunman, Reacher offers to help Helen (Rosamund Pike), the defending attorney, unravel what happened. The D.A. (Richard Jenkins) and lead investigator (David Oyelowo) want to solve the crime themselves. But Reacher has his own ways of doing things.

Pike as Helen is a weak figure who is supposed to have a kind of chemistry with Reacher who is a mysterious loner. Far more interesting are Robert Duvall, as a wry gun shop owner, and Werner Herzog, as a deadpan sociopath.

Cruise’s tightly controlled performance holds our attention all the way through to the tense finale.

Jack Reacher is good, it’s often great. The opening sniper attack is masterful (if badly timed) ratcheting up the tension in a way that would make Hitchcock proud. And the stripped down action scenes are exquisite. There’s a car chase around the midway point which is one of the best I’ve seen in years. The fights are quick, brutal and realistic - not to mention well shot. The finale is refreshingly free of pyrotechnics, and delivers real honest-to-goodness thrills, pitting Cruise against a handful of trained killers.

The film’s real ace in the hole is Cruise although Cruise doesn’t remotely resemble the literary Reacher. He’s terrific as the big-screen iteration, nailing all of his action scenes- making him look more formidable than most action heroes that dwarf him in size. He’s also a damn charismatic actor, nailing the chemistry with the stunning Rosamund Pike - who must be one of the sexiest actresses working in film today. Approaching fifty, Cruise has lost his boyishness, but he’s gained some grit and weariness, which he puts to good use as Reacher.

The rest of the cast is top notch as well, with Robert Duvall memorably showing up in the last act, and Jai Courtney making a good foe. David Oyelowo and Richard Jenkins are on-board as the stuffed shirts who get in Reacher’s way, and are appropriately smarmy. Of course, the guy everyone’s bound to be talking about is Werner Herzog, playing well, essentially himself as The Zec, a guy that’s so bad, he once gnawed off eight of his own fingers. Herzog’s a blast to watch, and seems to have fun with his own image.

The film Jack Reacher has more than enough action to please the fans of Tom Cruise; so do watch the film when it gets released on 28 December 2012.