You know that feeling when you're stuck in a middle seat, the cabin lights are dimmed, and the person next to you is just a little too friendly? That’s the exact skin-crawling energy Wes Craven captured in 2005. Honestly, Red Eye shouldn't have worked as well as it did. It’s basically a stage play set on a Boeing 747, yet it remains the gold standard for high-altitude anxiety.
I recently rewatched it, and Cillian Murphy’s transition from "charming seatmate" to "cold-blooded operative" Jackson Rippner is still terrifying. Rachel McAdams as Lisa Reisert is just as good—she’s not some invincible action hero; she’s just a smart hotel manager trying not to let her dad get murdered.
But once you’ve finished that 85-minute sprint, what’s next? If you’re hunting for red eye similar movies, you’re likely looking for three things: confined spaces, a psychological cat-and-mouse game, or travel-based terror.
The "I'm Trapped at 30,000 Feet" Essentials
If the airplane setting is what hooked you, there are a few heavy hitters that play with that same claustrophobia.
Flightplan (2005)
Released the same year as Red Eye, this one stars Jodie Foster. It’s a bit more "is she crazy?" than "assassin on a plane." Foster’s character wakes up from a nap to find her daughter missing, but the flight manifest says the kid never boarded. It’s got that same sleek, mid-2000s thriller sheen. While Red Eye is a straight-up chase, Flightplan is a gaslighting marathon.
Non-Stop (2014)
Liam Neeson doing what he does best. He’s an air marshal who starts getting texts saying a passenger will die every 20 minutes unless $150 million is transferred to an offshore account. It’s more action-heavy than Red Eye, but the mystery of "who is the killer in this metal tube?" keeps the tension high. It’s basically Red Eye if Lisa Reisert had a "particular set of skills."
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7500 (2019)
This one is for the purists. Joseph Gordon-Levitt plays a co-pilot during a hijacking. The crazy part? The entire movie takes place inside the cockpit. You don’t see the cabin. You only see what he sees on the grainy security monitor. It’s incredibly stressful. If the tight quarters of Red Eye made you sweat, this will make you want to never fly again.
Psychological Cat-and-Mouse Games
The best part of Red Eye isn't the plane; it’s the power dynamic between Lisa and Jackson. It's a conversation that turns into a hostage situation.
Phone Booth (2002)
Colin Farrell is trapped in a public phone booth in New York because a sniper (voiced by Kiefer Sutherland) has him in his sights. If he hangs up or leaves, he dies. Like Red Eye, the protagonist has to outsmart a villain who has all the leverage. It’s short, punchy, and relies entirely on the performances.
Nick of Time (1995)
This is an underrated gem that people rarely talk about. Johnny Depp is an ordinary accountant whose daughter is kidnapped at a train station. Christopher Walken (playing the Jackson Rippner role) tells him he has 90 minutes to assassinate a politician or his daughter dies. The movie literally plays out in real-time. It’s the closest vibe to the "ordinary person forced into a conspiracy" trope that Red Eye nailed.
P2 (2007)
Think Red Eye but in a parking garage on Christmas Eve. Wes Craven actually didn't direct this, but it feels like his brand of suspense. A woman gets trapped in a garage with a psychopathic security guard. It’s a smaller scale, but the "nowhere to run" factor is turned up to eleven.
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Why Wes Craven Switched Lanes for Red Eye
Most people know Wes Craven for Freddy Krueger or the Scream mask. He’s the "Slasher Guy." But Red Eye was his attempt at a Hitchcockian thriller. He swapped the supernatural for the situational.
Interestingly, Cillian Murphy has gone on record saying he doesn't think the movie is that great. He’s wrong. Sorry, Cillian. His performance is what makes the movie tick. He manages to be genuinely likable for the first 20 minutes, which makes the reveal so much more jarring.
The movie also hits on post-9/11 anxieties that were very raw in 2005. The idea that a threat isn't a guy with a bomb, but a guy in a suit sitting next to you, was a specific kind of modern horror.
Contained Thrillers That Aren't on Planes
If you’ve exhausted the "terror in the sky" subgenre, look at these contained thrillers that share the same DNA:
- Panic Room (2002): David Fincher. Jodie Foster (again). It’s the ultimate "trapped in a house" movie.
- The Commuter (2018): Another Liam Neeson one, but on a train. It’s basically Non-Stop on tracks.
- Buried (2010): Ryan Reynolds in a coffin for 90 minutes. It is the literal definition of a confined space thriller. It’s much darker than Red Eye, though.
- 10 Cloverfield Lane (2016): The tension between Mary Elizabeth Winstead and John Goodman is top-tier. You never know who to trust, much like the first act of Lisa and Jackson’s flight.
Misconceptions About the Genre
People often lump Red Eye in with "disaster movies." It’s not. A disaster movie is about the plane crashing. Red Eye is a crime thriller that happens to be on a plane.
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The stakes are personal. When you look for red eye similar movies, avoid the big "hijacking" films like Air Force One or Con Air. Those are fun, but they’re blockbusters. They don’t have that intimate, whispering-in-your-ear terror that makes Red Eye so effective.
What to Watch Tonight?
If you want the exact same "vibe" as Red Eye, go with Flightplan. If you want the "ordinary person vs. assassin" tension, watch Nick of Time. If you want to feel physically claustrophobic, watch 7500.
To get the most out of these, skip the trailers. Part of the magic of Red Eye was not knowing exactly when Jackson would flip the switch. Most modern trailers spoil the "twist" in the first 30 seconds. Put your phone away, turn off the lights, and let the paranoia sink in.
Next time you're on a flight, maybe just keep your headphones on and skip the small talk. You never know who's sitting in 5B.
To dive deeper into this genre, you should look into the "Contained Thriller" movement of the early 2000s, which focused on high-concept, low-location scripts that relied on dialogue and pacing rather than massive explosions. Check out the filmographies of directors like Jaume Collet-Serra or early Joel Schumacher for more in this vein.