Robert Redford gives this independent drama a jolt of star magnetism, but it’s not enough to shake it out of its psychological pretensions. Redford plays a wealthy executive who is kidnapped, and the rest of the movie follows two parallel strands: the executive’s increasingly abstract conversations with his abductor (Willem Dafoe) and his wife’s (Helen

Derailed belongs to the long movie tradition in which a basically good man makes a moral misstep that leads to his complete undoing, yet I can’t think of another movie morality play that details the undoing to such a ludicrous degree. A dependable if distracted husband and father (Clive Owen) begins an affair with a

Perhaps the high altitude explains why, after Red Eye, this is yet another ludicrously plotted 2005 airplane thriller. Just thinking about that thin air must mess with screenwriters’ heads. Flightplan – with Jodie Foster as a grieving widow whose daughter may or may not have been kidnapped mid-flight – is the far better picture because

Characters swap identities and dreams unfold within dreams in this romantic thriller from star Tom Cruise and writer-director Cameron Crowe. The story – which follows a rich young playboy (Cruise) after he’s disfigured in a car accident – is an intriguing mixture of pop psychology and science fiction, even if it’s not entirely original. The

Katie Holmes shows impressive range as a college senior who is helping a detective (Benjamin Bratt) investigate the two-year disappearance of her boyfriend. Her sly performance, at turns demur and devious, elevates yet another school-set thriller into something more psychologically layered.

Writer-director Chris Kentis’ independent picture will terrify anyone who has ever had some mysterious underwater object brush up against his or her legs. A shark-attack movie that uses real sharks, this manages to create legitimate chills by taking a no-frills approach to its central tale – that of a scuba-diving couple stranded in dangerous waters.