Red Eye (2005)

Originally Written

Tuesday, September 6, 2005

Red Eye stars the lovely Rachel McAdams as Lisa Reisert. She's the manager of a rather large and lavish hotel in Miami where the Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security is scheduled to stay with his family. Little does she know that when she boards a plane home that his family, her father and her own life will be all in her hands!

It all begins when Lisa meets Jackson (Cillian Murphy) in the airport terminal and begins to become friends with the rather strange but intriguing character. When she takes her seat on the airplane she discovers him seated right next to her. He jokingly asks her if she's stalking him, in which she nervously replies "No", in actuality it's he who is stalking her. Jackson has been sent to get her to call the hotel and change the room the Deputy and his family will be staying in, it's all part of a plan to assassinate him and if Lisa refuses to comply her father be be the collateral damage.  

While Red Eye is rather predictable, I still found the plot and the characters very entertaining. I liked the fact the film takes no time opening the can of worms right away.  The two main characters are quickly introduced and in minutes we're in the thick of the story. Because of this the film has excellent flow, never once dragging on and sticking with a very suitable run-time. Acting wise complements are thoroughly due to Rachel McAdams, who as always, gives a great emotional performance clearly terrified out of her mind and still managing to look beautiful the entire film!  It's hard to believe she got her big film break as the stuck up girl in Mean Girls! Cillian Murphy is great as well, he has that serial killer look in general and only helps that he backs it up with a flawless performance, as he did in Batman Begins. 

As a highly entertaining thriller, Red Eye gets nothing higher than an 8 purely due to it's over-exaggerated scenes and predictability. Such scenes include Lisa head butting Jackson later in the film and suffering no injuries from it when previously in the film Jackson head butts her on the airplane and knocks her out! And the scene where Lisa is looking for Jackson in her father's house, and he ends up popping out from the most obvious area. In the end, I still highly recommend checking this out.  It's entertaining, enjoyable and one of my favorite thrillers.

8/10