Movie Review—Eye in the Sky

Eye in the Sky

by Peter J. O'Connell

Eye in the Sky. Released (USA): April 2016. Runtime: 102 mins. MPAA Rating: R for some violent images and language.

Terrorists gather in a house in the fetid, teeming slum of Everleigh. Although it is on the outskirts of Nairobi, Kenya, Everleigh is largely inhabited by Somali refugees and is controlled by an Islamist militia. From Sussex, England, hardbitten Colonel Katherine Powell (Helen Mirren) commands a mission to have Kenyan troops capture the extremists in the Everleigh house.

A drone controlled from Nevada by USAF pilot Steve Watts (Aaron Paul) provides surveillance of the terrorists' meeting site and the surrounding area. Other surveillance devices, including one in the shape of a bird and another in the shape of a flying insect, provide more intel, as does Jama Farah (Barkhad Abdi), an Everleigh resident serving as an undercover agent for the anti-terrorist operation. 

The mission to capture the terrorists is changed to a mission to kill them with a drone-directed missile strike when it is discovered that the extremists have considerable explosives in their house and are preparing suicide bombers for what can be presumed to be an attack on a civilian target, similar to others that took place before in Kenya. 

The change of mission requires approval of a committee in London consisting of General Frank Benson (Alan Rickman) and assorted politicians and lawyers. The tangle of issues involved includes the balance between the benefits of foiling the terrorist plot and the negative publicity from the possible “collateral damage” of killing civilians in the area, particularly a young girl who has set up a stand in front of the target house in order to sell bread. The status of some of the plotters as U.K. or U.S. nationals is also a problem. 

Director Gavin Hood ratchets up tension to edge-of-the-seat levels as the debate on the issues proceeds in London while the terrorists' preparations continue in Kenya, and Powell grows impatient in Sussex while Watts develops qualms in Nevada. Innocents may die in Everleigh if there is a missile strike—or elsewhere in Kenya if there is not—and the clock is ticking.

The geographical range of the sites in the narrative grows as consultations take place with figures in Hawaii, D.C., Singapore and Beijing. The ideological range of the London debate reaches from the hardened pragmatism of General Benson to the sternly moralistic and legalistic approach of some of the lawyers concerned about abiding by the rules of engagement to the “cover your butt and pass the buck” attitude of some of the politicians. Director Hood provides spokespersons for each of the positions with time to make their points. But the course of events keeps posing new challenges to all of the characters, wherever located in this divided, yet technologically connected, world. And the technology involved is truly fascinating. 

Eventually, a decision is reached, and the grim consequences of it have to lived with—by those who do not die. As General Benson says: “Never tell a soldier that he does not know the cost of war.” The movie's last scene shows a drone in the sky and, perhaps, subliminally suggests that there is also another kind of “eye” up there watching what we mortals do—or don't do—as we struggle to deal with the moral and other dilemmas presented to us. 

Eye in the Sky is a superb film, one that achieves the rare feat of combining all the thrills of an action/suspense movie with the thought-provoking complexities of a challenging drama. The fine script (by Guy Hibbert), efficient direction and uniformly excellent performances, done in an ensemble manner, make those complexities accessible and moving for an audience.

“Footnotes” to the film: (1) Alan Rickman died since completing Eye. The much-admired actor first attracted the attention of American movie audiences as the terrorist leader in Die Hard (1988). (2) Barkhad Abdi was a Somali refugee working as a taxi driver in Minneapolis when he was chosen to play the role of a Somali pirate in Steven Spielberg's Captain Phillips (2013). Abdi received a Best Supporting Actor Oscar nomination for his performance. (3) Director Gavin Hood plays a role himself in Eye—the commander of the character played by Aaron Paul.