Review: 'Eagle Eye' focuses on the perils of technology

Photo by By Ralph Nelson

Shia LaBeouf and Rachel Holloman star in the mysterious conspiracy thriller "Eagle Eye."

Programming the Star-Spangled Banner to be a trigger for violent “regime change” in the U.S. is a diabolically intriguing notion. Unfortunately, by the time “Eagle Eye” and Francis Scott Key’s anthem reach their climax, viewers will have lost interest in the film, which smothers its interesting premise beneath blankets of narrative implausibility and incoherent shaky-camera action.

Photo by By Ralph Nelson

Shia LaBeouf and Rachel Holloman star in the mysterious conspiracy thriller "Eagle Eye."

Honestly, if you’re going to spend a fortune wrecking scores of automobiles for your movie’s big chase scene, shouldn’t you make sure that filmgoers can see and thus enjoy the destruction? No doubt director D.J. Caruso is familiar with the clean action sequences in the “Jurassic Park” and Indiana Jones movies crafted by Steven Spielberg, the executive producer of “Eagle Eye”; too bad Caruso eschews his boss’ action-leads-to- consequence-leads-to- reaction style of cinematic dynamism for the relatively recent but already old-hat chaos theory of filmmaking, which immerses the viewer in an impossible to read world of sudden cuts and wild (often digitally created) camera spasms. This eyeball-wobbling strategy works in the “Bourne” films because we are basically meant to be inside Jason Bourne’s head during the violence; but in “Eagle Eye,” a more traditional “North by Northwest”-style thriller about innocent people trapped in a world of spies and trickery, it’s counterproductive. Instead of pulling us into the movie, it alienates us.

“Eagle Eye” reunites Caruso and Shia LaBeouf, the team that made a hit with last year’s efficient “Disturbia” (for that film, the Hitchcock reference was “Rear Window”). This time, LaBeouf is Jerry Shaw, a low-level copy-center worker who is pulled into a mysterious plot when the female voice on the other end of his cell phone tells him: “You’ve been activated, Jerry. Your compliance is vital... Desertion is not an option.”

Jerry and another victim of this stranger, a young mother named Rachel (Michelle Monaghan), discover that their survival depends on their obedience to the voice, which seems to have God-like control of the nation’s technology, including traffic lights, cell phones, electronic billboards and so. (The notion of “cyberterrorism” also motivated the recent “Live Free or Die Hard.”) The voice commands Jerry and Rachel to rob an armored car and commit other violent, unlawful acts as part of some secret master plan. “We know who you are,” the voice says. “We are everywhere.”

Government officials played by Billy Bob Thornton and Rosario Dawson can’t understand how the previously unknown Jerry and Rachel can outwit the FBI and the military. Frankly, we can’t believe it, either. “Eagle Eye” becomes more interesting after the owner of the voice is identified, but the movie remains ridiculous. The mastermind behind the voice seems to have been influenced by those old comic books in which a supervillain would subject the hero to some elaborate and obviously escapable death-trap instead of simply shooting him in the head.

“Eagle Eye” is meant to be a cautionary tale about the abuse of power and the perils of technology — it’s the Cold War-era “Colossus: The Forbin Project” (1970), updated for the War on Terror/Patriot Act generation. Its warnings might seem more sincere if the movie ever stopped trying to indoctrinate us into being good consumers with its incessant product placement references; no fewer than three national chain businesses are mentioned during LaBeouf’s opening monolog alone.

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