In the new movie Eagle Eye, three characters participate in a re-creation of the famous crop duster sequence from Hitchcock’s North by Northwest. Only the plane from NbN has been replaced with an electrical tower and power lines, and it takes Shia LaBeouf, Michelle Monaghan and Anthony Azizi to perform Cary Gran’t part (Azizi also substitutes for the pilot and the farmer, I guess).

Such an homage is not surprising coming from director D.J. Caruso, whose last picture, Disturbia, is currently involved in a lawsuit for being an uncredited remake of Hitch’s Rear Window. This time, fortunately, Caruso borrows enough from other films, including Hitch’s second version of The Man Who Knew Too Much, 2001: A Space Odyssey and I, Robot, to keep from being sued by any single party. Eagle Eye will likely also remind audiences of The Dark Knight, if not for the similar cell phone surveillance tactics then for Caruso’s even less capable talent for directing car chases.

While Caruso does a good job at allowing his audience to compare him to better filmmakers (yes, even I, Robot’s Alex Proyas), he doesn’t give us the world’s worst redo of the crop duster bit (that is probably this). But he also doesn’t come anywhere close to giving us the best. And for such a famous scene that is so widely studied and imitated, giving us merely another so-so re-creation is very disappointing. After the jump, you’ll find some of my favorite tributes to North by Northwest, mostly paying homage to that one beloved sequence.

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• Scheduling the first major presidential debate on a Friday initially seemed like a mistake to me, as I figured most Americans would rather go out tonight than spend the eve of their weekend thinking about politics. Yet now I’m hearing about debate-watching parties, and Variety expects the event to curb moviegoing tonight — that is if the debate even happens. But even if it wasn’t going to be only teens populating the multiplex tonight, Eagle Eye would still rule the weekend, as is currently predicted.
• Continuing the studio’s push of The Dark Knight for Oscar, Warner Bros. is giving Academy members the option of being shipped a Blu-Ray screener, which will showcase the film’s Imax-friendly ratio changes, in order for voters to have “the best possible chance to see what we did technically.” Or members could actually go see films as they’re meant to be seen on the big screen. Fortunately, TDK is also being rereleased in January.
• Helen Mirren will star as a retired Mossad agent who must return to the job in John Madden’s The Debt, a remake of the 2007 Israeli film Ha-Hov. Though it’s probably more Munich than 007, as long as Mirren’s playing a role reminding me of Daniel Craig, I’m hoping there’ll be a gratuitous scene featuring a bikini-clad Mirren ascending from the sea.
• Nick Nolte will guide a pair of newly orphaned vacationing children in the indie Arcadia Lost, which sounds to me like a Greek-set Walkabout meets The Earthling, a film that most made me cry as a child due to the way Ricky Shroder’s parents die in a terrible Winnebago accident.

Eagle Eye from D.J. Caruso (Disturbia), starring Shia LaBeouf and Michelle Monaghan, opens this Friday in theaters. And, for the next few days, you can win Eagle Eye swag from Spout.

A mysterious woman turns the lives of two strangers, Jerry Shaw (LeBouf) and Rachel Holloman (Monaghan), upside down. They become the world’s most wanted–and attractive–fugitives. But as you wait to find out if Shia LaBeouf makes a better fugitive than an Indiana Jones (he’s got a thing for Harrison Ford roles), you can win crazy fugitive gear!

Each day this week we’ll be giving away a package containing one of each of the following

• Eagle Eye pen/flash drive (download files or write clues on paper)
• Eagle Eye t-shirt (makes a great tourniquet as well)
• Eagle Eye hoodie (for a quick disguise in a pinch, hoods up!)

New games go up each day and the winners are announced the following day. You can read the rules and see the prizes, here. Check back each day for the new game and good luck.