A standard tough as nails hit man who soon becomes a softie when he meets a hooker w/a heart of gold. Ben Foster & Elle Fanning star in this tale of a hit man working in the Texas area who is sent to make a collection, kills his quarry & rescues a woman at the scene he finds tied to a chair. Finding additionally some paperwork his employer desperately needs, the hit man blackmails him for a tidy finder's fee. Things get more complicated when the saved filly decides to make an unscheduled trip back home to pick up her younger sister & a gunshot is heard spurring all parties to hit the motel circuit to avoid capture. Based on a novel by Nic Pizzolatto (the creater/writer of True Detective) the film is shot well w/a definitive sense of place but the shortness of this outing & over-familiarity ruin things when the relationship between the 2 leads starts to get interesting. Directed by some time actress Melanie Laurent (Inglourious Basterds/Now You See Me), one wishes a streaming outlet or even HBO would've optioned this novel to be a limited series to expand on the story's twists, turns & byways but it is a nice calling card for the director who has a nice touch w/the material when it does work.
