In this day and age, it's considered somewhat common for people to be a little more paranoid. With technology being advanced every day, our society is becoming more and more like George Orwell's vision in 1984. Big Brother is watching. Even reading recent news stories about how scientists are working on ways to do so. This entire premise is put to effect in this film.
The story centers on two targests. The first is Jerry Shaw (Shia LeBeouf), a slacker that works at a Chicago-based Kinko's-type store. He has a twin brother in the Air Force. One day, Jerry heads to the ATM and discovers a massive amount of cash has been deposited into his accounty. Not saying anything, he withdraws some of it. When he gets back to his dingy apartment, he discovers that his place is now littered with boxes and boxes of advanced weaponry. Now, my first question is how did they get all these boxes in there without anybody (other than the landlord) without anybody saying anything? Then, Jerry gets a mysterious phone call from a stone-voiced woman who tells him that he's been "activated." She tells him to get out of there because the FBI will be in his place in 30 seconds. Of course, he doesn't comply and gets arrested...briefly. He's interrogated by Agent Thomas Morgan (Billy Bob Thornton, slightly more believable in this role than as the director of NASA in Armageddon), who doesn't believe anything Jerry says. Then, the stone-voiced woman calls Jerry on the FBI line, tells him to duck, and wouldn't you know it? A crane slams into the side of the building, missing Jerry by inches, so now he can escape. Somehow, this person that keeps contacting Jerry knows where he is at all times and can display messages anywhere, from a message board to a TV screen, instructing him what to do.
The second target is Rachel Holloman (Michelle Monaghan), a single mother to a little boy. She receives a phone call from the same woman, threatening to kill her son if she doesn't do as she complies. Coincidentally, Rachel's and Jerry's lives intersect when Jerry jumps in her car. They discover that the same person is pulling their strings, so they stick together. They end up on a cross-country trip to Washington, D.C., being closely pursued by Agents Morgan and Zoe Perez (Rosario Dawson), where they discover a vast program called "Eagle Eye" is being used to eavesdrop on people's cell phone calls and what not (a news story even discusses it briefly in the beginning). The program is headed by Defense Secretary Callister (Michael Chiklis) and unknowingly involves a huge political assassination (where all the major heads of state will be gathered for one night).
Eagle Eye is produced by Steven Spielberg, and they certainly let us know it. There are quite a few angles that are reminiscent of a Spielberg-directed thriller, Minority Report. D.J. Caruso is at the helm. He directed last year's Disturbia, which also starred LeBeouf. In my mind, Disturbia, albeit a direct rip-off of Rear Window, is a far more effective thriller than this one. The cast is good, although Chiklis must think he's still playing The Thing from The Fantastic Four because he shows absolutely no emotion at all throughout the movie. The story starts out fine, then becomes more and more unbelievable. There's a scene where Jerry and Rachel are at a Circuit City and old family videos of Jerry's and pics of Rachel's kid are flashing across a giant screen, while the woman talks to them. There are about a dozen other people in the store! How do they not see it? How do the FBI agents keep missing all that? We just reach a point where we shake our heads in disbelief, wondering, "What will they come up with next?" The big climax actually seems to be a rip-off of the climax in Get Smart, right down to a musical instrument being the trigger for a bomb. The movie makes nice use of Chicago's locales. For weeks, that's all I heard, was filming for this movie (well, that and The Dark Knight later on). A friend of mine even got hired as a stand-in for Monaghan, which I consider really cool. I was really psyched to see this film, but became more and more disappointed as it dragged on. The director, the producer, and especially the cast are fine. It's a different story they're in need of.
2 stars
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