The veteran actor is in talks to join Paramount and Skydance‘s One Shot, the Tom Cruise-starring procedural based on the novel of the same name by Lee Child. Also starring are Rosamund Pike, Richard Jenkins, Canadian newcomer Alexia Fast and David Oyelowo (you know him as the greedy Dr. Jacobs). The film is written and will be directed by Christopher McQuarrie, the scribe behind films like The Usual Suspects and Valkyrie. His only other directorial outing was the underrated 2000 crime thriller The Way of the Gun. [Variety]
The premise:
A shooting spree in the heartland Indiana turns a city on its head. The man accused of the massacre, James Barr, asks for ex-military cop Jack Reacher by name. Sure enough, Reacher appears days later and becomes embroiled in a web of corruption and scandal, involving everyone from young defense lawyer Helen Rodin, her father the District Attorney and a Russian crime syndicate full of mysterious shadowmen.
Duvall’s character is said to be small, with no clear word on who he’d be playing. The money is on that of a veteran ex-cop-turned-private investigator who helps Reacher unravel the mystery of Barr’s guilt/innocence. Cruise will play Reacher, of course. Pike will play Helen Rodin, the young defense lawyer who’s also the daughter of the city’s District Attorney (the role Jenkins will be playing). Fast will play Sandy, a female foil of Reacher’s while Oyelowo will turn it on as “a veteran homicide detective investigating the shooting.”
Both Fast and Duvall have bit roles based on these deductions/announcements, but, like any crime-y thriller like this, every bit player has some sort of significance, even if it means getting killed at the right time and place. Duvall’s made a bit of a career comeback transition playing roles like this (see his supporting wise old man role in Crazy Heart). After all, how many Get Lows are there lying around?
One Shot begins shooting later this fall in Pittsburgh.
Are you excited for One Shot?