Eagle Eye

D.J. Caruso, 2008 (6.6*)
You might call this a Patriot Act espionage film, it's certainly one about the new age of surveillance and waiving of individual rights in the name of national security to combat terrorism. This takes us into the near future, like Max Headroom's "20 minutes into the future", and an incredible plot unfolds that reminds one of several other films at once: War Games, Enemy of the State, The End of Violence.

This is actually a well-executed thriller, and even if you have seen similar films, it will still be entertaining - it has the stamp of producer Steven Spielberg. It is a fast moving action film from D.J. Caruso, especially in the beginning, then loses it pace in the middle like many others. However, it's far less brainy and plausible than the master's brand of fiction, likely due to the casting of Shia Leboeuf in the lead role. Somehow he just doesn't look like an action hero like Harrison Ford, Tom Cruise, or even Matt Damon - he always looks like the modern answer to a new John Hughes film.

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Peeping Tom

Michael Powell, 1960 (6.8*)
I'm recommending this for fans of both Psycho and the Powell/Pressburger films, such as A Matter of Life and Death (aka Stairway to Heaven), The Red Shoes, and Life and Death of Colonel Blimp. However, it's far more similar to Psycho than the other films of Powell's. This is an eerie story about a psychopathic film cameraman, who carries a handheld film camera around to photograph everyday events, almost as an obsession.

We find early in the film that his father was a scientist, who specialized in fear, especially in children. It apparently left Mark, played icily by Carl Boehm, with a decidedly Peter Lorre voice (it's uncanny!), a bit scarred emotionally and also voyeristic. He also enjoys watching people's emotional reactions, and especially on film. Of course, we also know early on he's a bit homicidal as a result, so the suspense comes in seeing if he will kill the women he's close to or if he's too close to bear hurting them.

For Powell, it's a bit overt compared to his more artistic films. As inspired by Psycho, it's actually quite good, as for me that film degenerated into a near laughable conclusion, while Peeping Tom never does that at least. Well filmed like all of Powell's, just not one of his best efforts to me.

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Dead Ringers

David Cronenberg, 1988 (6.8*)
This is an acting tour-de-force by Jeremy Irons, who plays twin gynecologists, one of whom has a decidely warped sense of reality. The brothers don’t let people know they are twins, which allows them to switch off with a new lover, played by Genevieve Bujold. It also lets them play around in a world of their own fantasy creation for the most part. Somewhere down road to bliss one brother takes a definitely wrong turn, and ends up somewhere between Salvador Dali and Marquis de Sade. Irons makes both brothers just slightly different, and turns in not only a career best performance but one of the best of all-time.

Puzzlingly, Irons wasn’t even nominated for an Oscar®; a group of actresses led a write-in campaign in protest but the Academy refused to accept the ballots. When he won the Oscar® for his next, and definitely inferior performance in Reversal of Fortune, he said “I have David Cronenberg to thank for this, and some of you out there know what I mean.” Like most Cronenberg films, this one is very disturbing and has some gore, which detracts from an otherwise interesting psychological study, but still worth seeing for the Irons performance alone.

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Burn After Reading

Coen Brothers, 2007 (6.5*)
This is an odd sort of Coen Brothers film, marketed as a comedy but a lot more serious, and it has a low energy level. Health club trainer Brad Pitt is given a CD by a janitor who found it on the floor, and its filled with some CIA information. He and fellow employee Frances McDormand both need money and decide to get a reward from the owner.

This turns out to be CIA analyst John Malkovich, who is extremely upset and feels that a 50k reward is extortion. Meanwhile George Clooney is sleeping with Malkovich’s wife, while his own wife, Tilda Swinton, is perhaps being unfaithful as well. Things turn worse after they make personal contact with Malkovich, and eventually everyone gets tangled up together in this thickly plotted excursion into general mayhem. Great actors here, including three Oscar winners (Clooney, McDormand, Swinton), but they unfortunately don’t have much acting to do in this, its mostly plot, and an incisive satire on the intelligence community, one that starts out funny but turns serious.

Listen to the incredible closing credit song, CIA Man by the Fugs – its got terrific lyrics, still relevant today.

“Who can kill a general in his bed, even a dictator if he’s red,
F-g A man, C-I-A man…
Who has got the secretest service, that makes the other service nervous,
F-g A man, C-I-A man…”

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