Passengers (2016)
Directed by Morten Tyldum
A spacecraft traveling to a distant colony planet and transporting thousands of people has a malfunction in its sleep chambers. As a result, two passengers are awakened 90 years early.
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His art-deco bar is modeled after the one Nicholson frequented in “The Shining,” an altogether more potent examination of the horrors of isolation.
Things take a decidedly dubious turn when he spies fellow Passenger and would-be writer Aurora Lane (Jennifer Lawrence), and he ponders the contrived ramifications of waking her up to his only real confidante, an android half-barman named Arthur played amusingly by Michael Sheen, who might be informed by The Shining (another tale of fear and isolation) and has an Isaac Asimov-esque line in philosophical deficiencies.
He is an android designed in the image of Lloyd, the creepy barkeep played by Joe Turkel in The Shining, and he speaks entirely in clichés.
Film fans will immediately detect a nod to “The Shining” in the bar sequences, which possess the same echoing sense of dislocation and weirdness.
The only company Jim has is android bartender Arthur (Michael Sheen), who has a friendly reserve that’s chillingly reminiscent of the Overlook Hotel barkeep in Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining — although Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey is much the greater touchstone for Passengers, especially the angle about relying on “foolproof” machines.
All alone and with no way of contacting the sleeping crew, Jim spends the next year roaming the empty ship, with no one else to talk to apart from a droid bartender played by Michael Sheen – a fittingly creepy character who seems to have been pulled straight out of The Shining.
The vastness of space, here, has been reduced to sitcom size, with none of the ruminative investigations that characterize the genre’s finest films, like “2001: A Space Odyssey,” ”Solaris” or Interstellar.”
Jim is in a hibernation pod on the spaceship Avalon, headed from Earth to a colony planet called Homestead II, when the ship (which looks like a hybrid of a couple of crafts from “ 2001: A Space Odyssey ” embraced by a helix) goes through a meteor shower.
Director Morten Tyldum, working from a script by Jon Spaihts, doesn’t push the sci-fi genre forward as much as quote some of its greatest hits, from “ 2001: A Space Odyssey ” to “ Moon ,” “ Gravity ” and “ The Martian ” and Ridley Scott’s “ Prometheus ,” which Spaihts also wrote.
The only company Jim has is android bartender Arthur (Michael Sheen), who has a friendly reserve that’s chillingly reminiscent of the Overlook Hotel barkeep in Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining — although Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey is much the greater touchstone for Passengers, especially the angle about relying on “foolproof” machines.
“Passengers” is supposed to be some sort of combo platter of “2001: A Space Odyssey” meets “Titanic,” but it is difficult not to chuckle as a massive space station soars through space while the story careens all over the place, as if the screenplay had been struck by structure meteors creating some deadly plot holes.
The Blue Lagoon meets 2001: A Space Odyssey in the new movie Passengers, an intense romantic drama about two lonely souls abandoned on a giant spacecraft.
It’s Alien and Jim is the monster.
A plot that references 2001 and the first Alien in its opening moments (and the classic Doctor Who story The Ark In Space throughout) has mechanical engineer Jim Preston (Chris Pratt) mysteriously awoken from cryogenic slumber aboard the starship Avalon 30 years into its 120 year journey to Homestead II, a faraway planet that will eventually pick up some of the slack from an overpopulated Earth.
And I do mean far: the journey takes 120 years, during which the Avalon's 5000 passengers are in deep hibernation, like Ripley in Alien.
First seen in Alien (1979) and reimagined as cellular-level magic in Elysium (2013), the autodoc’s surgical capacities were unflinchingly featured in Prometheus (2012), which was scripted by Jon Spaihts on the strength of his Passengers screenplay.
No, this isn't the second coming of "Alien" where the Nostromo crew is brought out of hibernation for what initially appears to be a rescue mission but ultimately boils down to a nefarious (and ultimately deadly) reason behind the wake-up call.
Directed with panache by the bold stylist Morten Tyldum (Headhunter, The Imitation Game), the story begins with passengers and crew in suspended animation for the long haul in cool-looking sleep pods straight out of James Cameron’s Aliens.
We’re reminded of the old Lina Wertmüller movie Swept Away, in which a spoiled rich woman is stranded on an island with a working-class sailor after their cruise ship sinks.
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The people who made “Passengers” may have wanted to heighten our sense of wonder with a few space walks reminiscent of “Gravity” (minus the dramatic gravity).
And the movies — “Gravity,” ”Interstellar,” ”The Martian” — have been among the best blockbusters in recent years.
Take two of Hollywood’s hottest stars (Jennifer Lawrence and Chris Pratt), maroon them on a long-haul space flight, add some tricksy Gravity-style survival problems, drop in a soupçon of Interstellar-level life and death profundity and, hey presto, high-concept mega-hit meets awards season hopeful.
Take a heaping helping of “Titanic,” mix it with healthy doses of “The Martian” and just a pinch of “Gravity.”
Director Morten Tyldum, working from a script by Jon Spaihts, doesn’t push the sci-fi genre forward as much as quote some of its greatest hits, from “ 2001: A Space Odyssey ” to “ Moon ,” “ Gravity ” and “ The Martian ” and Ridley Scott’s “ Prometheus ,” which Spaihts also wrote.
There is, at first, a thrilling what-if in Jon Spaihts’ screenplay, which concocts a sort of Titanic in outer space, with dollops of “Sleeping Beauty” and Gravity thrown into the high-concept mix.
Yes, its possible to do both as Robert Zemeckis and Tom Hanks did in Cast Away.
So Preston is left to roam around the spacecraft — which is like a gaudy futuristic cruise ship hurtling through space — all by his lonesome, like Tom Hanks in “Cast Away.”
It’s “Cast Away” in the cosmos, and it would have worked, but then Jim decides he deserves company.
Most films featuring stories of people stranded in some deserted place -- think of Tom Hanks in "Cast Away" as an example -- show the physical hardship of such an ordeal.
At this point, "Passengers" shifts from an oddly toned isolationist drama - think "Cast Away" set on the "WALL-E" spaceliner, complete with goofy robots - to featherweight romantic comedy.
The film is at its best when it shows Jim — who’s charming, but never nails his Cast Away impression — doing his damnedest to stay sane in near-total isolation on the ship.
Los temas planteados por el guion de Jon Spaihts, quien también colaboró en el libreto de Prometeo (2012), tocan venas cercanas a Solaris (1972) de Tarkovski con la irreverencia post apocalíptica del programa televisivo Last Man On Earth; y la elegancia formal de Gravedad de Cuarón o Sunshine de Danny Boyle; pero tal como ésta última, todo su potencial es destruido por otra angustia, terriblemente banal: la recaudación monetaria.
You won't find Moon's musings on isolation, Solaris' pondering of love and loss, or Sunshine's psychological complexity here.
(Earlier, a slingshot around a burning star likewise recalls Danny Boyle’s underrated Sunshine .)
Only one screenwriter—Jon Spaihts, who also co-wrote Ridley Scott’s Prometheus (2014) and Marvel’s most recent hit Doctor Strange (2016)—is credited, and I have not read anything that his screenplay went through a major overhaul ala J.F. Lawton’s for Pretty Woman (1990) to make its potentially disturbing story more palatable to a mainstream, Christmas-season audience.
Perhaps earlier drafts reflected that, and it got turned into a love story ala Pretty Woman ?
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There's an information kiosk ripped off from Duncan Jones's Moon.
Director Morten Tyldum, working from a script by Jon Spaihts, doesn’t push the sci-fi genre forward as much as quote some of its greatest hits, from “ 2001: A Space Odyssey ” to “ Moon ,” “ Gravity ” and “ The Martian ” and Ridley Scott’s “ Prometheus ,” which Spaihts also wrote.
Because for its opening 45 minutes or so, “Passengers” is a reasonably cunning slice of commercial sci-fi, even as it overtly recycles the strategies of films like “The Martian” and “Moon.”
Passengers does land wide of cinema’s space-odyssey brass rings – it’s nowhere near as soulful or questing as 2001 or Moon – but as popcorn entertainment, it’s surprisingly provocative.
El largometraje, que funciona como un tipo de mezcla entre los filmes Wall-E, Titanic y Moon, incluye una premisa muy atractiva e interesante.
You won't find Moon's musings on isolation, Solaris' pondering of love and loss, or Sunshine's psychological complexity here.
The vastness of space, here, has been reduced to sitcom size, with none of the ruminative investigations that characterize the genre’s finest films, like “2001: A Space Odyssey,” ”Solaris” or Interstellar.”
This star-powered sci-fi romantic drama puts forth a compelling premise and its style consciously calls to mind past classics, invoking films like 2001 , Solaris, and Wall-E .