Movie: Passengers
My Rating: 3 stars
I love a good sci-fi movie—especially if it’s a sci-fi thriller. So, although this movie never got the best reviews, I was still pretty interested in seeing it. The premise sounded pretty intriguing. Thousands of people are being transported in suspended animation on a long-haul luxury space-liner. The trip is supposed to take over a hundred years, but after only a decade or so into the journey, one man wakes up. Although all the other sleeping passengers are still there with him, he’s essentially alone with no way to fix his predicament, and no way to tell anyone what’s happened. That’s a very haunting prospect—to be surrounded with plenty, but to know you’re going to spend the rest of your life utterly alone. It was enough to intrigue me.
I liked this movie. The movie is pretty slick looking, and the actors are very charming. Chris Pratt plays the unlucky man who awakens early. Michael Sheen is the bartending robot who is the only company Pratt has to rely on at first. And, Jennifer Lawrence, is the lady he has his eye on. Of course, there are always going to be complaints about the way a director has handled the material. And, I’ve read a number of articles proposing alternate treatments of this script. And, of course some of them had good points. Most of them proposed ways to build suspense in a more effective way. But I wasn’t fundamentally dissatisfied with the way this movie turned out. To me, this movie was more about exploring the idea of coming to terms with such a sudden change in fortunes than it was about creating suspense. The philosophical and ethical questions the script raised were more important to me than the “thrilling” ones. Although, there is a good amount of dramatic tension too.
This is a pretty fun movie. I think I could go either way on recommending this one or not. I enjoyed it. And, I’m glad I watched it. But, I can also acknowledge people’s complaints. But, the movie is slick, and pretty, and proposes some pretty interesting ideas.