Not quite what those switching on for a Dennis Quaid-Meg Ryan-James Caan-Gwyneth Paltrow movie probably have in mind, this is a grim, slow, but occasionally absorbing retribution drama set on the desolate Texas plains.

Thirty years before the main action, a farming family takes in a 'mute' boy found wandering in their yard, unaware that the kid's the front man for his thieving father (Caan), for whom he unlocks the door.

Things go wrong and tragedy ensues: the family, with the exception of the baby, is slaughtered.

Decades later, the boy (now Quaid), not surprisingly taciturn and withdrawn, ekes out a living filling slot machines; the father has disappeared.

By accident, Quaid gets involved with a girl (Ryan) who... but no, you don't need a crystal ball to see the rest of the story, nor Caan's re-emergence in it.

In the end the plot develops into a conventional thriller, even if at times it has seemed to be thinking it's something deeper.

Caan and Paltrow steal the show as the baddies; there's no sign at all of the trademark Quaid smile.