Eye in the Sky(2016)

Plot Summary

• EYE IN THE SKY stars Helen Mirren as Colonel Katherine Powell, a UK-based military officer in command of a top secret drone operation to capture terrorists in Kenya. Through remote surveillance and on-the-ground intel, Powell discovers the targets are planning a suicide bombing and the mission escalates from capture to kill. But as American pilot Steve Watts (Aaron Paul) is about to engage, a nine-year old girl enters the kill zone triggering an international dispute, reaching the highest levels of US and British government, over the moral, political, and personal implications of modern warfare.

Storyline

• Colonel Katherine Powell (Dame Helen Mirren) is a U.K.-based military officer in command of a top secret drone operation to capture terrorists in Kenya. Through remote surveillance and on-the-ground intel, Powell discovers the targets are planning a suicide bombing and the mission escalates from "capture" to "kill". But as American pilot Lieutenant Steve Watts (Aaron Paul) is about to engage, a nine-year old girl enters the kill zone triggering an international dispute, reaching the highest levels of U.S. and British government, over the moral, political, and personal implications of modern warfare. — Bleecker Street Working with her American counterparts and the Kenyan military, British Colonel Katherine Powell (Dame Helen Mirren) is about to launch an operation that, if successful, will lead to the capture of the Number 2, 3, and 5 terrorists on the American list of most wanted terrorists in East Africa. Amongst the group they hope to arrest are British nationals Susan Helen Danford, now known as Ayesha Al-Hady (Lex King), her husband, and a recently radicalized young man who just arrived from the U.K. There is also a radicalized American in the group. Her plan to capture the group goes awry when they suddenly decamp to a new location and Powell wants to move to Plan B: a kill mission. The result is a debate amongst those in charge - in London, there is Powell's commanding officer Lieutenant General Frank Benson (Alan Rickman), a junior minister and the British Attorney General; the British Foreign Secretary is at a trade conference; and the U.S. Secretary of State is in China - on whether they can proceed. From somewhere in the U.S. Midwest, Lieutenant Steve Watts (Aaron Paul) is flying the U.S. drone in the sky above Nairobi, and is the man who will ultimately pull the trigger if the kill mission is approved. Complicating matters, however, is the sudden appearance in the "kill zone" of a young girl selling bread. Do they proceed knowing there will be collateral damage? — garykmcd