Director Werner Herzog has signed on to portray the villain in One Shot for Paramount Pictures and writer-director Christopher McQuarrie.

Werner Herzog will play The Zec, a former prisoner-of-war who stages the sniper killing at a mall which results in five casualties. The story centers on Tom Cruise's Jack Reacher, a former military police officer who investigates the shooting. Rosamund Pike, David Oyelowo, Richard Jenkins, and Robert Duvall also star.

Christopher McQuarrie is directing One Shot from his own screenplay, which is adapted from the Lee Childs novel of the same name. One Shot is the ninth book in the author's Jack Reacher series.

Werner Herzog is primarily known as a documentary filmmaker, directing such films as Cave of Forgotten Dreams and Grizzly Man. This will be his first major acting role, although he has made cameo appearances in The Grand, What Dreams May Come, Mister Lonely, and Julien Donkey-boy.