Red Eye (2005)

☆ ☆ ☆

Red Eye (2005) – W. Craven

I haven’t seen too many Wes Craven movies (Nightmare on Elm Street – some thirty years ago, Scream, and maybe not much else).  But this concise thriller shows that he has skill enough to create suspense, film action, and keep the audience hooked.  85 minutes is enough.  Rachel McAdams and Cillian Murphy, both good, past their big hits but not yet in career decline, star as the competent heroine (a hotel manager) and the ruthless bad guy (terrorist/assassin).  Most of the film takes place on a plane where they are seated together in the two seats by the window, flying from Houston or Dallas to Miami.  The plot turn is as follows: he needs her to move the secretary of defence (or some such politician) to a different hotel room so that he can be assassinated and he has a hitman stationed outside her dad’s house to force her to call the hotel and make the change.  That’s it.  Very minimal but, again, well done, tight, and no time to ask about plot holes.  It ends as you might expect but no complaints – it is what it is and you got what you paid for.