Monday, Sep. 29, 2008

'Eagle Eye' finishes a bit fuzzy

By Edward Robertson, atomictown.com

If modern government surveillance is so intrusive that even dopey action movies like Eagle Eye are calling it out, I say we rise up in revolution right now.

Ready...go.

No? Thanks, jokers, I'll just be off for my stitches now. FYI, Police batons are harder than backs of heads. Lucky for all of us that, before suffering this latest brain damage, I came up with a Plan B: lead such insanely boring lives that everyone monitoring us retires in disgust.

I'm already leading by example, because that's what kind of guy I am. I don't have cable. No Internet, either. I wake up at noon each day, get barked at by a dog for four hours, then watch my one remaining Simpsons DVD on repeat until my body tells me it's time to close my eyes again. Sometimes, I try to remember what rice tastes like, but not too often, because then I'm so worn out I need a nap, and the dog union gets mad when you make them work irregular hours. Think the lowliest of FBI interns is going to tolerate more than two days of watching that? So hop on board already. Let's get Big Brother out of our lives once and for all.

In Eagle Eye it's not Shia LaBeouf's day. On his way back from his twin brother's funeral, he finds $750K in his bank account, his apartment filled with guns and explosives, and, according to a mysterious caller, the feds on their way.

The caller offers a way out, but LaBeouf refuses and is arrested by FBI agent Billy Bob Thornton. That doesn't stop the caller, who has godlike access to surveillance and intel, from busting LaBeouf out and pairing him with single mom Michelle Monaghan, who's been similarly "activated" in the caller's madcap plan.

The motivation of that plan is far from clear, but it leads LaBeouf and Monaghan on a wild chase away from the feds as they gather materials for a bomb.

For a while, Eagle Eye moves swiftly enough and is slick enough to let you overlook how very, very ridiculous it is. Controlling traffic lights to aid LaBeouf and Monaghan's escape? OK, I'm with you. Dragging countless bystanders into aiding and abetting them? Uh, OK; a big enough bribe or harsh enough threat is enough to crack the toughest man; I'd punch you right now for a sip of warm water. Causing the spontaneous combustion of power lines with enough precision to blow some dude on the ground to hell? Undeniably cool, but undeniably ludicrous.

A mid-movie turn of the plot makes this faintly plausible. (Get off me, I said "faintly.") By then, director D.J. Caruso's maintained momentum action-wise and lost it interest-wise. Sadly, there is a limit to how much absurd crap can take place before numbness sets in. Here, I'd put it around the 40-minute mark.

A better sense of humor might have propped Eagle Eye up. With its Mongol horde of screenwriters -- four in all -- you'd imagine one of them could tell a damn joke.

Thing is, screenwriters are like strippers. One is great. Two, if they get some teamwork going, can be better. Any more than that, though, and not only does it get expensive even when you're down to tucking dimes into their drawers until they're jingling like bells, but they also get in each others' way. Arms get twisted. Hair gets pulled, and not in a good way. You end up with so much lipstick on your shirt it looks as if you took a flying leap into a keg of strawberry jam.

I no longer remember what I'm talking about. Right: strippers. And a script that can't pay off on several potential-heavy threads. Eventually, the plot congeals into an interesting, if testicle-free, finale capped by an honest-to-God moral helpfully delivered in the form of a courtroom speech. Booyah.

Oh, de-booyah, that's no good at all. Eagle Eye is kept exciting from moment to moment by fun performances, snappy action, and an amusingly absurd concept. Lack of execution and a bland end dooms it.

Grade: C