Thoughts on the movie Passengers (MAJOR SPOILERS)
I know this is a departure and kind of flies in the face of my "bibliophile" moniker, but I am a -phile of many things, and after books, movies are probably my next great love.
When I first saw this trailer I was thrilled. Jennifer Lawrence and Chris Pratt in space?!? It looked so stylish too. Just take my money already. Then came the reviews. If you want to see the film, you may want to stop reading because I'm going to go into some detail.
The main reason for most of the negativity is the main plot point. Here comes the spoiler: Chris Pratt's character Jim is the only one that is awoken by the malfunction. Not both characters, just one. He has no idea why, and no idea how to get back into his pod. He finds manuals and tools and tries, almost trapping himself in the pod at one point. He tries to break into the crew quarters. I mean he TRIES! You may only see a few moments, but as the camera pans out, you see all the tools, all the panels he's removed, all the burn marks on the wall. This isn't just knocking on the door and waiting a sec to see if someone answers, this is a concerted effort. He emails customer service, only to find that it'll be like 50 years before he gets a reply, due to the distance from Earth.
Having an entire fancy-pants ship to yourself sounds kind of like fun. He plays basketball, he starts totally rocking the hologram-y futuristic Just Dance game. But virtual reality is no substitute for real reality. The ship only allows him the most basic of foodstuffs because he's on the economy flight, something like indentured servitude. His life becomes a humdrum existence, then a burden. He lets himself go. What's the point, after all? That's easily understandable. Eventually he comes *thisclose* to killing himself. But despite the overbearing monotony of his life, the will to live is simply too strong. Then he finds Jennifer Lawrence's character Aurora.
Now I'll concede the point, why her? It could have been anyone. It's a little convenient. But sometimes we see someone and our breath is stolen from us. I can't count the number of times it's happened to me. There's no rhyme or reason to love (or lust or infatuation or crushes or whatever label you want to pin on it). So Jim is swept away by Aurora. He searches the data files on the ship and finds out all he can about her. Then it occurs to him to just wake her up.
This isn't a decision he comes to lightly. He battles with himself. He talks to the only "being" available - the android bartender played by Michael Sheen. Now this bartender is only programmed to utter the most random of new-agey truisms that change according to whichever way Jim is leaning at that particular moment. Not much help. Jim loses the moral battle with himself and wakes her up. The guilt he feels afterwards is obvious. When they finally meet you learn what I think is the horrible truth. Jim has been awake for over a year.
Let that sink in, because this is what I think everyone is missing. A year. Completely alone. Can we truly understand that? There used to be a time when solitude was attainable. And maybe it still is in places like Wyoming or Montana where there vast areas of land where there is literally nothing but grass and sky. But critics most likely don't live in rural Wyoming or Montana. They exist in, or very near, the epicenters of civilization, the cities. We are never alone. I've spent the last few days of this year going to movies, having a nice meal beforehand, all by myself. But there were people all around me. Even having a conversation with another person, it's never just us and that person anymore. We are bombarded by social media from dawn til dusk and even when we go to sleep, the lucky ones of us sleep beside another person (or in other cases, a pet). Explain to me how this situation with Jim and Aurora isn't like Tinder?
The original article I read talked about one particular scene. After Aurora finds out the truth, she's pissed. She calls him a murderer. He tries talking to her, but she won't listen. So one day when she's jogging, he starts talking to her over the ship's PA. They say she is literally running from him and he is still aggressively attacking her, this time verbally, in a way she is unable to escape. They call his actions those of a stalker, compare them to a kidnapping. One critic, FlickFilosopher, calls it "an act of wanton moral depravity", "willful cruelty", and " a crime committed with malice aforethought." No. This is an unimaginably lonely man making, admittedly, stupid decisions out of sheer desperation. He knows what he faces should she cut him off completely. She has no idea. She has never experienced what he has. Even when he first tells her he's been alone for a year, she is sympathetic. But sympathy is not empathy. She is us. She hasn't the faintest clue of what he's had to bear and how close to the brink he has come. She will never know. Perhaps by the end she gets an inkling. But that is all she will ever have. All we will ever have.
I ask you: what would you do differently?
This part of the film is probably the most profound exploration of humanity I think I've seen. It explores a part of us we can't imagine and extrapolates that out to its most logical conclusion. As humans we crave companionship. For all our bitching and moaning about other people, they are an integral part of us, a need as necessary as air, water, food, etc. For this alone I am defending this film.
What disappoints me is that after this point, the film devolves into what it's selling itself as, a sci-fi action flick. There's no point in telling you any more. It's pretty standard stuff. I wish there had been more exploration of this interpersonal dynamic. I think there were more psychological areas to be explored.
But the most glaring issue? The one I truly can not get over? There's 5300 people on this ship, and only one bar. No bueno.
When I first saw this trailer I was thrilled. Jennifer Lawrence and Chris Pratt in space?!? It looked so stylish too. Just take my money already. Then came the reviews. If you want to see the film, you may want to stop reading because I'm going to go into some detail.
The main reason for most of the negativity is the main plot point. Here comes the spoiler: Chris Pratt's character Jim is the only one that is awoken by the malfunction. Not both characters, just one. He has no idea why, and no idea how to get back into his pod. He finds manuals and tools and tries, almost trapping himself in the pod at one point. He tries to break into the crew quarters. I mean he TRIES! You may only see a few moments, but as the camera pans out, you see all the tools, all the panels he's removed, all the burn marks on the wall. This isn't just knocking on the door and waiting a sec to see if someone answers, this is a concerted effort. He emails customer service, only to find that it'll be like 50 years before he gets a reply, due to the distance from Earth.
Having an entire fancy-pants ship to yourself sounds kind of like fun. He plays basketball, he starts totally rocking the hologram-y futuristic Just Dance game. But virtual reality is no substitute for real reality. The ship only allows him the most basic of foodstuffs because he's on the economy flight, something like indentured servitude. His life becomes a humdrum existence, then a burden. He lets himself go. What's the point, after all? That's easily understandable. Eventually he comes *thisclose* to killing himself. But despite the overbearing monotony of his life, the will to live is simply too strong. Then he finds Jennifer Lawrence's character Aurora.
Now I'll concede the point, why her? It could have been anyone. It's a little convenient. But sometimes we see someone and our breath is stolen from us. I can't count the number of times it's happened to me. There's no rhyme or reason to love (or lust or infatuation or crushes or whatever label you want to pin on it). So Jim is swept away by Aurora. He searches the data files on the ship and finds out all he can about her. Then it occurs to him to just wake her up.
This isn't a decision he comes to lightly. He battles with himself. He talks to the only "being" available - the android bartender played by Michael Sheen. Now this bartender is only programmed to utter the most random of new-agey truisms that change according to whichever way Jim is leaning at that particular moment. Not much help. Jim loses the moral battle with himself and wakes her up. The guilt he feels afterwards is obvious. When they finally meet you learn what I think is the horrible truth. Jim has been awake for over a year.
Let that sink in, because this is what I think everyone is missing. A year. Completely alone. Can we truly understand that? There used to be a time when solitude was attainable. And maybe it still is in places like Wyoming or Montana where there vast areas of land where there is literally nothing but grass and sky. But critics most likely don't live in rural Wyoming or Montana. They exist in, or very near, the epicenters of civilization, the cities. We are never alone. I've spent the last few days of this year going to movies, having a nice meal beforehand, all by myself. But there were people all around me. Even having a conversation with another person, it's never just us and that person anymore. We are bombarded by social media from dawn til dusk and even when we go to sleep, the lucky ones of us sleep beside another person (or in other cases, a pet). Explain to me how this situation with Jim and Aurora isn't like Tinder?
The original article I read talked about one particular scene. After Aurora finds out the truth, she's pissed. She calls him a murderer. He tries talking to her, but she won't listen. So one day when she's jogging, he starts talking to her over the ship's PA. They say she is literally running from him and he is still aggressively attacking her, this time verbally, in a way she is unable to escape. They call his actions those of a stalker, compare them to a kidnapping. One critic, FlickFilosopher, calls it "an act of wanton moral depravity", "willful cruelty", and " a crime committed with malice aforethought." No. This is an unimaginably lonely man making, admittedly, stupid decisions out of sheer desperation. He knows what he faces should she cut him off completely. She has no idea. She has never experienced what he has. Even when he first tells her he's been alone for a year, she is sympathetic. But sympathy is not empathy. She is us. She hasn't the faintest clue of what he's had to bear and how close to the brink he has come. She will never know. Perhaps by the end she gets an inkling. But that is all she will ever have. All we will ever have.
I ask you: what would you do differently?
This part of the film is probably the most profound exploration of humanity I think I've seen. It explores a part of us we can't imagine and extrapolates that out to its most logical conclusion. As humans we crave companionship. For all our bitching and moaning about other people, they are an integral part of us, a need as necessary as air, water, food, etc. For this alone I am defending this film.
What disappoints me is that after this point, the film devolves into what it's selling itself as, a sci-fi action flick. There's no point in telling you any more. It's pretty standard stuff. I wish there had been more exploration of this interpersonal dynamic. I think there were more psychological areas to be explored.
But the most glaring issue? The one I truly can not get over? There's 5300 people on this ship, and only one bar. No bueno.
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