'Eagle Eye': Paramount's Failed Experiment

Paramount misunderstood why Universal's Bourne trilogy and their own Transformers flick became such huge hits when they made a big-budget hybrid of the two 

Shia LaBeouf and Michelle Monaghan in 'Eagle Eye' (CREDIT: Paramount)

                     by Jack Linsdell

Back in 2008, Paramount (not Disney) was ruling Hollywood. They were the one stop shop for the biggest blockbusters of the era, turning original and IP-driven epics into hit movies. They also were the most successful studio around when it came to generating new and popular franchises. This was the year that they turned the MCU (Paramount owned it before Disney did) into a blockbuster powerhouse with Jon Favreau's Iron Man ($585 million worldwide on a $140 million budget) and successfully revived the classic Harrison Ford adventure series with Steven Spielberg's Indiana Jones And The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull ($790 million on a $185 million budget). They also turned Matt Reeves' Cloverfield into a hit movie ($172 million on a $25 million budget) and then a successful trilogy the year after they gained a new A-level franchise with Michael Bay's Transformers ($709 million on a $150 million budget). But, hidden beneath their successes of 2007/2008 is Eagle Eye - the failed experiment that proved Paramount had completely misunderstood what had turned those movies into such big hits. 

D.J Caruso's espionage action-thriller Eagle Eye is not a "bad" movie by any means. The DreamWorks-produced flick is a highly engaging and immensely entertaining piece of popcorn escapism, grounded by the sheer talent and charisma of it's terrific cast. That's not to oversell the movie as being a high work of art or anything, which it isn't, but as a big-budget blockbuster it does what it's meant to do. The film follows two strangers (Shia LaBeouf and the always superb Michelle Monaghan) who are forced to go on the run together after receiving a mysterious phone call from a "woman". Madness and mayhem ensues as this voice uses the powers of smart technology to track their every move, making sure they complete the assignment she's tasked them to do. It's actually not a bad hook and the climax is genuinely a surprise. 

Anyway, critics didn't feel the same way with very mixed reviews. And, despite a strong domestic performance of $101 million (from a $29 million opening weekend), the film bombed overseas with only $76 million making a measly $178 million worldwide total on an $80 million budget a disappointment. Add on $39 million in domestic DVD sales alone and it might have broken even with $220-240 million final cume. However, it certainly didn't make Paramount a profit and we never got an Eagle Eye 2 (not that it set a sequel up) or "the next Eagle Eye" from the studio either. The point was that Eagle Eye failed (in relation to cost and expectation) because Paramount misunderstood what had made it's recent hit movies into, well...hits. 

Remember, by this time, Universal had wrapped up it's highly successful Bourne trilogy with Paul Greengrass' The Bourne Ultimatum in 2007. Those Matt Damon-led thrillers not only redefined the whole action genre and forced the 007 franchise to change too, but also won a heap of awards and were critically acclaimed. They also were unprecedented box office smashes in that every sequel out grossed it's predesccor, something only the John Wick series has done since. So, Paramount saw the success Universal had gained with their Bourne movies, watched as their own Michael Bay-directed Transformers flick created a blockbuster franchise and then believed if they made a hybrid of the two they'd get similar results. Spoiler...they didn't. 

To cement Eagle Eye as a "done in the style of Bourne from the folks behind Transformers" hybrid, and to make sure it was sold as Paramount's next success story, they even recruited the same people who worked on both hit series. Eagle Eye starred Shia LaBeouf in the peak popularity of his career, fresh off leading roles in Paramount's Transformers flick and their Indiana Jones sequel Crystal Skull (in which he played Ford's son). Spielberg who'd been a director/producer on Crystal Skull and executive producer on Transformers was meant to direct Eagle Eye before passing and remaining attached to the project as an executive producer. Patrick Crowley who had produced the Bourne trilogy with Frank Marshall was a producer on this one too. Paramount clearly believed that audiences would turn Eagle Eye into their next hit movie solely because it was made by (and starring) some of the folks who'd turned the Bourne flicks and Transformers film into blockbuster hits that those same audiences had enjoyed. Fun fact: the mass audience aren't film nerds and don't care whose in and/or making their latest blockbuster. 

As for the film itself, DJ Caruso directs Eagle Eye in the same "shaky-cam" style as employed by directors Doug Liman and Greengrass for the Bourne flicks. Editor Jim Page also employs Universal's action franchise's signature quick-cut editing aesthetic which helps make Eagle Eye feel like a fast-paced, kinetic thriller that flashes you from start to finish. The film also stages it's large-scale action sequences with an emphasis on spectacle and high collateral damage like Bay's Transformers movie, sharing a similar "epic" feeling. Eagle Eye also shares technological and thematic similarities with that 2007 blockbuster, with a bit of The Minority Report thrown in too. 

Anyway, the point is that Paramount learned the hard way with Eagle Eye. Just because a film is made in the same style, with similar thematic content, as well-liked blockbusters, and shares the same cast/crew with those hit movies doesn't automatically turn it into a hit itself. Eagle Eye is an entertaining movie in it's own right, but it failed for Paramount because they tried to make into into the "next Transformers" or the "next Bourne flick". In a year filled with unmitigated wins for Paramount, Eagle Eye was the one black mark. It may have failed as an experiment but at least Paramount learned the hard way. Or, maybe they didn't (see Top Gun Maverick).