Whenever an actor dies after filming a movie, a curious process takes place. A sort of movie-goer shorthand takes effect. Most of the significant aspects of that movie—the cinematography, the direction, the writing—take a back seat to the performance of the dead thespian. Even the title of the movie becomes irrelevant, as it will forever after be known as “so-and-so’s last movie.”

Sometimes this can work in a movie’s favor. The death of Brandon Lee loomed over The Crow like a friendly ghost, and transformed it from a pretty mediocre action/revenge film into a cult classic. If it weren’t for Raul Julia’s death, Street Fighter would be blissfully relegated to the utter obscurity it so rightly deserves. When a film is bad, a dead actor can provide a little bit of box office oomph.

However, when “so-and-so’s last movie” is good enough to stand on its own merits, that convenient label can be a noose around the neck of an otherwise memorable film. That’s why it’s too bad that American Gun will be forever known as nothing more than “James Coburn’s last movie.” Though the Academy Award winning actor’s performance is key to the success of the film, director Alan Jacobs has enough important things to say about grief, denial and loss that make the film worth watching, regardless of the fate of its leading actor.

The story follows Martin Tillman (Coburn) and his attempt to deal with the death of his daughter, Penny (Virginia Madsen). While visiting Martin and her mother, Anne (Barbara Bain), over the holidays, Penny is shot in an encounter with a masked robber in a parking lot.

Martin, unable to move on, becomes more and more isolated from those who he was previously most close to. He has trouble speaking to his wife, he cannot face his pastor and his only meaningful interaction is through letters he writes for his dead daughter. Eventually, he takes time off from work to travel around the country, tracking the former owners of the gun that was used to kill his daughter in an effort to find the last person to possess it. As he does, he finds out it was used by one man for a murder-suicide, and by another woman to protect herself from a serial killer.

After reading this synopsis, I expected the film to be either a Death Wish caliber (rim shot) revenge epic, with Coburn shooting his way to the ultimate bad guy, or a heavy-handed morality tale about how all firearm owners are murderers.

I was pleasantly surprised to find that it was neither. Martin’s quest is never framed in terms of revenge, but rather in terms of his own need for acceptance, and while the film does acknowledge a danger inherent in gun ownership, it does not demonize the institution, nor those who choose to own guns. This film is above all else a study in loss and grief.

What makes this an effective film about those emotions is the honesty with which the grief of Martin and Anne is portrayed. Long shots linger over a tray of cold cuts at the funeral party, and Martin communicates more through silence than through predictable laments about his daughter. It is these subtle details, this realistic depiction of the banality of loss, that makes the film so accurate in its portrayal of grief. Even when director Alan Jacobs uses clichéd techniques like shots of Martin at his daughter’s gravestone or the letters to his dead daughter, that sense of honesty remains.

The man most responsible for this frank depiction of grief is Coburn. In many ways this film rests upon his performance as the grieving father and he proves game for the challenge. For an actor whose main attributes are an ability to growl on cue and a face of roughly the same texture as tree bark, Coburn gives a surprisingly nuanced performance. Long typecast as a snarling villain, Coburn here relies more on facial expressions and silence than yelling, and it pays off.

The only thing that really disappointed me was the film’s ending. This movie, like so many others, suffers from Fight Club syndrome, that irresistible urge for a surprise ending that changes the fabric of the movie. What Jacobs fails to realize is that such surprises were effective in Fight Club and The Usual Suspects because the audience had no emotional investment in the film.

I was impressed when I learned about the real identity of Tyler Durden because I didn’t particularly care who he was. I did not feel sympathy for him, or compassion, or anger, and that gave me the luxury of readjusting my perception of him without subsequently changing my judgment of the film.

I won’t ruin the surprise ending of American Gun for you. I will say that for a film resting upon an honest depiction of grief, to reveal that honest depiction as somewhat fraudulent is to render much of the emotional power of the film null and void. I liked the film before the ending, and I liked it much less afterwards.

However, the movie is still worth seeing, if only for a top-notch swansong from Coburn. And if you can walk out ten minutes before the end of the film, so much the better.

American Gun opens today at the Megastar Theater in Edina.