Director Gavin Hood (Tsotsi) sets his sights on the unnerving topicality of the war on terror in Eye in the Sky, his latest release. Overseeing the action from remote perspectives, Col. Katherine Powell (Helen Mirren) compiles, assesses and makes recommendations on up-to-the-minute data about an impending strike on a compound in Kenya that serves as the base for a suicide terrorist enroute to an attack. Questions arise when the potential for collateral damage emerges — a young girl enters and begins to play in the kill zone — stalling the military and political operatives when every second counts. A superlative cast featuring Aaron Paul, the late Alan Rickman and Barkhad Abdi backs Mirren up, but the film works best as an anxiety-inducing intellectual and ethical thriller that draws viewers into real-world debates being waged behind the scenes of the tragic situations covered all-too regularly on cable news. (Opens Friday at Esquire Theatre) (R)
This article appears in Mar 23-30, 2016.