Eagle Eye

MOVIE #1,589 • 🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿 • 04.29.24 • VOLUME LXIII • Maybe it's because I never watch movies like this that it resonated so much with me? But I honestly think this is an extremely well-done, quasi-sci-fi thriller. The film really moves and it kind of slides in the exposition, which is fairly dense, without stalling the action. And if I had known there was a flick wherein Julianne Moore voiced a HAL 9000-like computer that becomes sentient, I would have signed up well before the Gods of TRUE RANDOM bestowed this gift upon me. I don’t know studio hack/journeyman D.J. Caruso from a hole in the wall, and seeing that he’s now working for The Daily Caller (Ben Shapiro’s thing), it feels weird to say that this movie has OK politics but it’s anti-surveillance state message is sorta on point/dare I say, ahead of its time?

Caruso has a fascinating filmography. This was his second biggest hit, bringing in over $200-million worldwide (his biggest is the third installment in the Vin Diesel’s XXX film series) and other entries include Two for the Money (a sports movie), Disturbia (a psychological thriller), I Am Number Four (a sci-fi based on a Y.A. novel), Standing Up (a family film), and The Disappointments Room (a horror). This dude is all over the map! But the thing that really struck me about Eagle Eye was how well the action set-pieces are put together: each one just kept getting crazier and crazier and the CGI elements are fairly seamless, especially for 2008, like when this rogue drone flies through a tunnel fucking shit up…


It’s not a perfect story (a little too outlandish/high concept for dummies) but it’s definitely better than the somewhat watchable/entertaining fodder it seems to have been labeled as (it's sitting at 28% on R.T. so that assessment itself might be generous). I think it’s a legitimately good movie with a solid cast that’s really edited and paced to near perfection. A pleasant surprise.

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Eagle Eye is a 2008 American thriller film directed by D. J. Caruso from a screenplay by John Glenn, Travis Adam Wright, Hillary Seitz and Dan McDermott. The film stars Shia LaBeouf, Michelle Monaghan, Rosario Dawson, Michael Chiklis, Anthony Mackie, Billy Bob Thornton. Its plot follows two strangers who are forced to go on the run together after receiving a mysterious phone call from an unknown "woman" who uses information and communications technology to track their every move. It was released on September 16, 2008.