Meskada is a 2010 American crime drama film written and directed by Josh Sternfeld and starring Nick Stahl and Rachel Nichols as police detectives assigned to investigate a home invasion in which a young boy is murdered in the commission of the crime.
While Shane stands guard, Eddie breaks into what the men believe to be an unoccupied home in the fictitious Midwestern town of Hilliard.
Dennis lies to the police about his whereabouts at the time of the crime in order to cover up an extramarital affair that he's carrying on with the niece, Nat (Grace Gummer), of the owner of the local bar, Billy.
Caswell is applying to the Meskada County Commission to permit a pharmaceutical company to take over a factory that was closed five years before.
Allison, during a rowdy town hall meeting, publicly accuses him of trying to protect his hometown by stalling her son's murder investigation.
In Shane's clutched hand are petitions covered with signatures from Caswell residents lobbying for the pharmaceutical company's permit to be approved.
Even though Noah knows that the killer is still at large, in an act of compassion, he tells a questioning Allison that the dead man was the murderer, and that there was no other accomplice.
[2] Derek Adams of Time Out said that "[the film is s]mall in scope but smart in the way it deals with how cozy communities react when something rotten surfaces in their world".
[3] In an interview with the Los Angeles Times, Mark Olsen wrote that "[the film is g]ood but perhaps not good enough", adding that "Meskada can be thought of as solid letter-grade-B work".
[4] According to Robert Koehler of Variety "Meskada uneasily merges crime drama, police procedural and social commentary in a potentially serious depiction of schisms in contemporary rural America".