A Single Shot

I like the mystery of this film, I liked the tone and I loved the cast! However, the film tends to forget its methodical, slow pace towards the end and decides that they did enough character development and decides to wrap things up quickly…whether or not you knew who the responsible parties were. This movie could have been great if more care was taking into the growth and development of the players (heck, even just making sure the characters are introduced by name would have helped) as it was to make sure the film was dark, grimy and depressing. While not terrible, “A Single Shot” triumphs with great performances and a fantastic tone but fails with its lack of expansion on some important players in the story.

I really wanted to like it more than I did it has lots of good parts, like the cast and the cinematography, but you keep asking yourself why you'd want to identify with the lead character, and for me, I couldn't come up with an answer. Rockwell's acting is terrific, but his John Moon gets fooled all the time, outwitted by idiots, doesn't take hints, makes foolish moves, and just makes it hard to like him, even as an anti-hero. Compare this to a masterwork like No Country For Old Men, and you'll see that each part pales in comparison by at least a little. No Country may have dark characters, but they're fascinating and their actions are interesting and worthy of contemplating Single Shot is missing this. All told, however, it's that first minute where you watch John Moon make a bad decision and you never recover your faith in his ability to lead you to a satisfying end.