Red Eye (film)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Red Eye | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Directed by | Wes Craven |
| Produced by | Chris Bender Marianne Maddalena |
| Written by | Carl Ellsworth |
| Starring | Rachel McAdams Cillian Murphy Brian Cox |
| Distributed by | DreamWorks SKG |
| Release date(s) | August 19, 2005 DVD: January 10, 2006 |
| Running time | 85 min |
| Language | English |
| IMDb profile | |
- For the Korean film released in 2005, see Red Eye (Korean film).
Red Eye is a 2005 drama/thriller film, directed by Wes Craven and written by Carl Ellsworth. It follows the story of Lisa Reisert as she is held captive, threatened and used as a tool in part of an assassination plot by Jackson Rippner aboard a red eye flight to her home in Miami.
Contents |
[edit] Plot
Lisa Reisert (played by Rachel McAdams) has a fear of flying, and after attending her grandmother's funeral in Dallas, Texas, she has to take a night flight (called a red-eye flight, hence the movie title) to Miami, Florida. She meets Jackson Rippner (played by Cillian Murphy), whom she initially finds charming and ends up having a drink with him to wait for their delayed flight to board. When they both bid goodbye to each other after their shared drink, they end up sitting next to each other on the plane, much to Lisa's surprise. After the plane has taken off, however, Rippner reveals that he is an operative working for a group who intends to assassinate the Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security, and Lisa is instrumental in their plans because of her job at the Lux Atlantic Hotel as acting manager. If she refuses to cooperate, then Rippner will prompt a hit-man to kill her father. Reisert has no way of getting help without jeopardizing her father's safety, and the longer she waits, the harder it will be to prevent the murder. She tries to alert the passengers and flight attendants of her flight, but in both attempts, Rippner thwarts her. The first attempt is when she writes a warning in a woman's book. When Jack finds out, he headbutts her unconscious. The next attempt was when Lisa goes into the bathroom and writes another warning on the mirror, Jack runs in when she tries to leave. Jack then starts choking her nearly strangling her, when he finally lets go of her throat he starts erasing the writing on the mirror while she is gasping for breath.
The assassination plan is to use a portable missile launcher from a boat in a nearby harbor and fire it at the hotel. The problem is that the Deputy Secretary likes to stay in a different suite, one that faces the city (away from the harbor). In order to assassinate him, Rippner must force Lisa, who is the manager of that hotel, to make a phone call from the airplane and order the hotel staff to change his reservation to a particular suite that faces the harbor. If she doesn't cooperate with Rippner, he will have her father murdered by a hit-man who is waiting just outside her father's house in Miami.
After one failed attempt due to turbulence from the storm in which the telephone was disconnected, Lisa successfully makes the phone call, and the hotel staff moves the politician to the targeted suite. The Secret Service checks and clears that room, and the Secretary settles in with his family. After the airplane lands and arrives at the gate, Lisa stabs Rippner in the windpipe with a pen, steals his cell phone and bolts off the plane into the terminal. She runs through the airport and steals a car so that she can drive to her father's house in order to save him before Rippner calls the hit man. On the way, she makes a cell phone call to the hotel to warn them to evacuate immediately and that the deputy director is a target of an assassination plot. The Secret Service gets the Secretary and his family out of the room just seconds before the Stinger missile is fired and the missile hits the hotel.
At the end of the film, Lisa rushes to her father's house to see if he's safe. She finds the hit-man right outside the front door, and she runs him over with the SUV. Lisa's father stumbles out of the kitchen, shocked at the man who was lying dead in the foyer and tells her that the police are already on their way. While Lisa calls her hotel to see if everything's alright, Jackson Rippner shows up and knocks out her father so that he can deal with her first. He chases her around the partially renovated house with a knife (nod to Jack the Ripper) and finally ends up throwing her down a flight of stairs. Grabbing the knife from where's Lisa's knocked it to with her hockey stick, Lisa crawls down the last few steps to where a gun is lying next to the dead man. She threatens Jackson with the gun but he still tries to get away and she shoots him. He kicks the gun out of her hand and grabs her by the hair when finally, Lisa's father shoots Rippner just as the police arrive, though whether he actually dies is unknown. At the hotel, the Homeland Secretary and the Secret Service are grateful to Lisa and her assistant Cynthia, who also helped save the day by pulling the fire alarm.
[edit] Cast
- Rachel McAdams — Lisa Reisert
- Cillian Murphy — Jackson Rippner
- Brian Cox — Joe Reisert
- Jayma Mays - Cynthia
- Jack Scalia - Charles Keefe
- Colby Donaldson - Body Guard
[edit] Reception
Red Eye was mostly praised prior to the theatrical release, and has earned an overall rating of 80 on Rotten Tomatoes and 71 on Metacritic.
Red Eye gained high praise from many popular publications, including the Washington Post, Rolling Stone, Entertainment Weekly, Los Angeles Times, New York Times, and Roger Ebert in the Chicago-Sun Times. The film grossed $57,859,105 domestically, making back and doubling the estimated $25,000,000 budget, which doesn't take into account DVD sales.
[edit] Possible sequel
Wes Craven spoke about the possibility of a sequel to the movie thriller. According to his interview from Empire Magazine, he said that it is possible to extend the Cillian Murphy and Rachel McAdams's characters, because they had such an incredible chemistry. He said that it would be fascinating to have something like Jackson Rippner being held hostage by the government and needing her help for some reason. They would be the oddball duo: they hate each other and eventually become a tight-spun team. He added, although it would be a nice idea, and he confirmed that there was a general interest, it might prove to be a tricky proposition. According to him, Rachel McAdams would be trickiest to assign the role to because she has a manager who is cautious about her career. The script would have to be really terrific to pull off such a risky storyline, and if there is one, Wes Craven might possibly direct the sequel.
[edit] Trivia
- In South Korea, this film was released as "나이트 플라이트" (Night Flight) to distinguish from the Korean film of the same name, which was released in the same year.[1]
- Jackson Rippner's name is a pseudonym based on Jack the Ripper, selected to have the same initials as Joe Reisert, Lisa's father, so that Reisert's initialed wallet will not raise suspicion in Rippner's possession. Incidentally, Rippner threatens Lisa with a knife near the end of the movie - another nod to Jack the Ripper.
- This film was written for Sean Penn and Robin Wright Penn. However, Wes Craven decided to go with younger leads who weren't as recognizable.
