Fear factor, in flight

Red Eye (2005)
Dreamworks Pictures presents a Wes Craven film, starring Rachel McAdams and Cillian Murphy. Written by Carl Ellsworth. 85m. Rated PG-13 for some intense sequences of violence and language.

2.5 stars

Irish-born Cillian Murphy is a professional disarming agent.

That trace of a lilt, those unassuming blue eyes, a scruffy surfer cut. He doesn’t look like the kind of guy who is running middle management in a hit job.

That’s why “Red Eye” worked. One minute Jackson (Murphy) is waxing poetic about God’s beautiful creation, the Tex Mex. The next, he’s telling Lisa (Rachel McAdams) that someone is going home in a bodybag.

“Red Eye” is certainly not the first film to inject the claustrophobia of coach class with the taut, suspense-laden script (next month’s Jodie Foster-vehicle, “Flightplan,” looks to take similar strides). But it preys violently on our feelings of helplessness while navigating the skies at 30,000 feet.

Perhaps more villainous is that Jackson actually has the gall to seduce his mark in one of the few places that random interactions with strangers is actually encouraged (also see last month’s “Wedding Crashers”). We’re impressed that he’s able to guess her drink of choice and that he’s pleasantly chatty about her family. But my neck tingled a bit when he informs us that all the interaction was intelligence-gathering, at least for this late night jaunt from Dallas to Miami. “Red Eye” turns on a dime, giving you no sense - unless you peeked at the trailer - that it would be playing out as anything but a paint-by-numbers rom-com.

We learn that the pre-flight flirting was a crude self-evaluation for Jackson, who reveals that he’s been stalking the front desk manager and making copious notes about the inanities of her life. He seems genuinely irritated by her rebuff of a Sea Breeze, for example, because that was what all of his late night surveillance told him. It’s guys, like Jackson, who pay attention to the little details that should be calling the shots of this entire operation.

But Jackson is part of an faction whose motives are entirely unclear, except that their target is homeland security czar Charles Keefe (Jack Scalia). I appreciate that the plot eschews the minutiae of Jackson’s group. Are they extremists? Vigilant anti-war types? The question, as horror wizard Wes Craven has figured out, is: Does it really matter, considering where the true tension lies?

Lisa is offered a quasi-Catch 22 by her seatmate in the 18th row. As matron of a luxurious Florida hotel/hotspot, she can make the call to switch Keefe to a more assassin-friendly suite. If she is non-compliant, Jackson will ensure her doting father (Brian Cox) will meet the wrong end of a switch blade.

Ladies and gentlemen, your new question is: How does Lisa solve the riddle that is getting her way on both accounts? Aye, there’s the rub, or the climax of this compact thrillerette.