Despite a solid premise that should lead to compelling drama—about men scarred by war and the morally grey inner workings of the police—Confidential Informant devolves into a half-baked thriller that's as dull as its title. Flat direction, a lack of connective tissue between scenes, and an unfortunately visible lack of production resources suck the life out of the script and from the actors' performances. There's clearly a foundation to be built upon here, but the film makes a crucial mistake in trying to have its cake and eat it too: it wants to deliver all the (unsatisfying) thrills of an antihero police procedural, but it just doesn't have the money or the creativity to do this, on top of being a character drama. And so any tension that it tries to build up deflates by the end, its characters nothing but hollow shells, stuck in a story that that never gives them a chance to be anything more interesting.

In different hands (and after a number of rewrites), the film's base premise could really lead to something much more successful. One can imagine a version of this script that leaves behind all the obligatory drug bust stuff and focuses squarely on how these policemen characters feel trapped in a world where violence is their only escape. Unfortunately, it really seems like many of these production companies—themselves trapped in a gradually shrinking industry—would rather churn out generic genre pieces instead of taking a risk on more challenging material from filmmakers who are just trying their best.