While returning by plane from her grandmother's funeral, hotel desk manager Lisa Reisert (Rachel McAdams) finds herself sitting next to a charming young man with piercing blue eyes named Jackson Rippner (Cillian Murphy). Rippner is pleasant enough at first, but their conversation takes an unexpected turn when he reveals that, unless she does exactly as he says, her father (Brian Cox) will die. What he wants is fairly straightforward: Lisa must make a call to the hotel where she works and use her authority to have a prominent politician, William Keefe (Jack Scalia), moved to a different room in order to facilitate his assassination. Lisa, however, is not one to give in without a fight and soon finds herself embroiled in a desperate battle of wills and wits with the blue-eyed assassin...

Red Eye comes hot on the heels of Wes Craven's previous project, the disastrous Cursed. An attempt by producers Bob and Harvey Weinstein to recreate the runaway success of Scream, Cursed again paired Craven with writer Kevin Williamson but was reportedly interfered with by management at every level, with the end result being sloppy at best, if not downright embarrassing. Red Eye seems to have been Craven's attempt to rebound: not only was it rushed into production to combat Cursed's sour aftertaste, it also constitutes a complete change of territory, abandoning the horror genre in which he made his name in favour of a straight thriller.


Indeed, the change of scenery seems to have been precisely the shot in the arm Craven so desperately needed. It may not be a masterpiece by any stretch of the imagination, but it is a fast, fun and undemanding thrill ride which, in addition to being hugely entertaining, is his best film since the original Scream (which isn't exactly saying much, I admit). The thriller genre fits Craven's sensibilities like a glove, given as he is to extended set-pieces of high tension. Viewers with a penchant for these will be well-served with Red Eye, which, after a slightly overlong first act, is essentially one long rollercoaster ride (to use a tired but completely appropriate cliché) which barely halts to let the audience catch its collective breath. The effect, spread over a lean 85 minutes, is akin to slowly climbing a steep slope, reaching the summit and then hurtling to the bottom at full speed. It's exhilarating and serves as an excellent reminder of just how good Craven can be when he's on the ball.

A significant factor in the film's success is the quality of its central performers. Although Brian Cox is wasted in the role of the father - a thankless and underwritten part - Rachel McAdams and Cillian Murphy both shine and, luckily, consume most of the screen time. McAdams is able to turn on a dime between portraying a terrified wreck and an assertive young woman who refuses to be anyone's victim, and it is a credit to Carl Ellsworth's script that she comes across as a believable character who avoids the usual mistakes and seems constantly to be searching for a window of opportunity to allow her to escape. The character of Rippner could easily have come across as a caricature, but Cillian Murphy strikes the perfect balance, never portraying him as implausibly suave while at the same time maintaining his cool. A lot of credit for the film's driving pace must also go to Marco Beltrami, who, after years of churning out bland and derivative horror music, seems finally to have found his muse, delivering a highly effective pounding action score.


At the same time, though, Red Eye is not without its flaws. I already mentioned the overlong first act, which is "setup" material of the most blatant sort. Additionally, while the ad nauseam pop culture deluge of the Scream trilogy is thankfully absent here, a couple of infuriating references do rear their ugly heads, the worst of these being the name of Cillian Murphy's character, which really doesn't require explanation (and just because you draw attention to this in the film doesn't let you off the hook, Wes). Finally, while the script is, for the most part, logical, a couple of moments simply don't stand up to close scrutiny. Chief of these is the hit man waiting to take out Lisa's father who, we are informed, won't do anything unless he gets a call from Rippner. If this is the case, why does Lisa not simply yell the place down? Rippner would surely be apprehended before he had the chance to make that all-important call, and Lisa's father would remain safe. The scenario would make more sense if, for instance, it was stated that the hit man would kill Lisa's father if he hadn't heard from Rippner after a certain period of time, but as it stands this is a glaring plot hole that hurts the film's credibility. The interesting thing is, it could probably have been forgiven were it not for the fact that, in all other areas, Lisa is remarkably rational even when under extreme pressure.

Ultimately, however, these flaws, while certainly not insignificant, can be ignored easily enough if you are able to get into the spirit of the movie and allow it to take you where it wants to go. Like other recent 'lean' thrillers such as Panic Room and Cellular, Red Eye takes a very simple story and, by exploiting a central gimmick, turns it into a solid exercise in tension. It won't win any awards any time soon, but, spurred on by new material, Craven seems to have been reinvigorated and goes some way towards reclaiming his nickname of "Master of Suspense". Hopefully he has a few more such films up his sleeve.


DVD Presentation

The transfer is par the course for a recent big-budget release: anamorphic, in its correct aspect ratio and definitely on the right side of watchable but with noticeable filtering and edge enhancement. These artefacts become particularly visible on large-scale displays, with the frozen grain patterns a sure sign of digital manipulation and the overall sheen of softness standing out in wide shots. In every other area, though, the transfer is faultless.

The primary audio option is an English Dolby Digital 5.1 track, which is effective but never goes quite as far as I would have liked, with the rear channel effects being reserved primarily for the plane's take-off and landing sound effects. English stereo and French 5.1 tracks are also included, and, in a generous move, DreamWorks have provided subtitles in English, Spanish and French for the film and all of the bonus features (including the commentary).


Extras

DreamWorks have served up a decent if not particularly weighty selection of extras for this release, beginning with the 12-minute The Making of Red Eye. Although hardly the most in-depth featurette ever produced, it is somewhat better than the usual EPK fluff, skimming over most of the main areas of interest while managing to be more than simply a collection of clips from the film. Certainly, it could have been longer, but I'm not convinced that a movie like Red Eye requires a 2-hour documentary on its production.

The 11-minute Wes Craven: A New Kind of Thriller focuses more specifically of the director and how Red Eye diverges from the rest of his filmography. This is definitely the weightier of the two featurettes on the disc, actually delving into the nature of the thriller (Craven sums it up quite effectively as being "about the vulnerability of the soul" whereas horror is "about the vulnerability of the body" - an oversimplification, perhaps, but one with some truth behind it) and doing more than just try to provide an overview of the entire production process. Oddly enough, this featurette also includes a section on the film's casting which I feel would have been better suited to the previous "making of" piece.

The most solid extra is definitely the audio commentary, which, as usual, teams Craven up with his regular producer and editor, Marianne Maddalena and Patrick Lussier respectively. The trio have recorded a few commentaries together before, and have long since mastered the drill. It's certainly not the most revelatory commentary in the world, but, like the film, it is an enjoyable enough way to spend 85 minutes.

There is also a 6-minute gag reel, which I personally can take or leave - some of the outtakes are funny, some patently aren't - and previews for Just Like Heaven, The Island and Cry_Wolf.


Overall

DreamWorks have put together a decent enough DVD for Red Eye. With a strong if unremarkable audio-visual presentation and some lightweight but enjoyable extras, this release is certainly not a milestone in any way, but people are unlikely to be disappointed with what is, ultimately, a solid but unexceptional DVD for a solid but unexceptional movie.

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