Jack Reacher - C+

Rated PG-13, 130 minutes

Cruise's back in the mildly enjoyable yet rote thriller "Jack Reacher"

Tom Cruise and Robert Duvall

If you're a Tom Cruise fan, you'll likely enjoy his new thriller "Jack Reacher." If you're not, you will likely tolerate it. Slow-moving but peppered with a handful of fun moments, it's a pretty standard whodunit that mostly just goes through some familiar paces. After a sniper kills five people in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, police arrest a man named James Barr (Joseph Sikora), a former Army sharpshooter, who asks them to contact Jack Reacher (Tom Cruise), a drifter and former Army Military Police officer. Working as an investigator for Barr's defense attorney (Rosamund Pike), Reacher unravels a case involving a hired killer and a Russian known only as "the zec" (Werner Herzog). Mildly entertaining with a little grit thrown in, "Jack Reacher" is a disappointing effort, but not for the reasons you might think. Directed by Christopher McQuarrie ("Valykrie")  and faithfully based on the novel "One Shot" by Lee Child, the 5'7 Cruise is an odd casting choice for Reacher, who in Child's book is a physically imposing, tall ex-military figure. Cruise's small stature actually makes Reacher more squirrely and he handles the fight scenes adeptly, but the cookie-cutter, overly familiar plot and characters gives it a well-worn feel, not to mention the film has some pacing problems, particularly in its draggy second act. The most memorable actor in "Jack Reacher" is not Cruise but the crusty presence of Oscar-winner Duvall as a shooting-range owner, who shows up late in the film and essentially walks off with the best lines and scenes; it's also nice seeing acclaimed director Herzog as the villain, albeit an oddly milquetoast one. "Jack Reacher" isn't a terrible movie but a very familiar one you've seen before many times, and without Duvall, this would be a big time waster.

Wes's Grade: C+