Decent But Flawed

Rating: 7/10 (17 January 2019)

28 December 2012. Jack Reacher is one of the few movies which upon reflection was worse then when it was experienced. The plot flaws abound in the movie which detract from the movie and some of the scenes were over the top in a bad way. Nevertheless the movie sustained its consistent suspense and reached levels of intense emotional outrage in a good way. Finally, the ending of the movie was admittedly slick and emotional appealing.
SPOILERS. However, (1) the idea of the deliberate assassination of one person cloaked in the apparent random deaths of three other innocent people doesn't ring true because it was much more reasonable to believe other less drastic means would have been likely available to achieve the outcome sought. (2) the idea of a second shooter positioned so far away from the first shooter would have been technically impossible to cover up through ballistic testing and it would have been at least more reasonable to have had a second shooter positioned sufficiently close to the first shooter to take ballistic testing into account. (3) the bumbling second lay attack in the bathroom with Reacher in the bathroom scene was over the top dumb and not really believable, even to the point where Reacher is caught off guard so easily and then as fate would have it, avoid further injury with so many accidental misses. (4) the Reacher and assassinate hand to hand combat scene was also pretty lame not just for its fight scene, but for Reacher to just not shoot the man. (5) Robert Duvall was just too lucky because the better assassin was mysteriously out of the picture too long and never himself attempted to take out Robert Duvall, (6) Reacher's ability to shoot the investigator hiding behind the defense lawyer was just a script device, at least Reacher would have been better off just taking his time and shooting through the hole his eye had looked through.
Other movies more technically pure and also as action appealing are The Shooter (2007), The Specialist (1994), Enemy of the State (1998). The Pelican Brief (1993) has the same intensity and consistency in action and conspiracy.