DIRECTOR:
Morten Tyldum LEAD CAST: Jennifer
Lawrence, Chris Pratt, Michael Sheen, Laurence Fishburne, Andy García WRITER: Jon Spaihts PRODUCERS: Neal H. Moritz, Stephen Hamel,
Michael Maher, Ori Marmur FILM EDITOR:
Maryann Brandon GENRE: Science Fiction
Romance CINEMATOGRAPHY: Rodrigo
Prieto MUSIC: Thomas Newman PRODUCTON COMPANIES: LStar Capital, Village
Roadshow Pictures, Wanda Pictures, Original
Film, Company Films, Start Motion Pictures DISTRIBUTORS: Columbia Pictures COUNTRY: U. S. A. LANGUAGE: English RUNNING TIME: 1 hour & 56 minutes
Technical
Assessment: 2.5
Moral
Assessment: 2.5
Cinema Rating: A14
MTRCB Rating: PG
Engineer Jim
Preston (Chris Pratt) is onboard spaceship Starship Avilon with 5,000
passengers in suspended animation as they are on a 120-year voyage to a distant
colony planet called Homestead. As the ship passes through an asteroid field,
it encounters malfunction and one of its hibernation pods opens prematurely,
waking up Jim from hibernation 90 years early. Rattled, Jim tries everything he
can to put himself back to sleep inside his hibernation pod, but to no avail.
He is faced with the fact that he will forever be stranded in space alone and he
will not make it to Homestead. Instead, he will die in the ship from either
loneliness or old age. Then he catches sight of fellow passenger, Aurora Lane
(Jennifer Lawrence) who is still in her hibernation pod. He investigates Aurora’s background and he becomes
fascinated by her. He finds out he can wake
her up from hibernation but doing so would put her on the same fate as his. But
then, he cannot stand the aloneness in the spaceship. He has to make a tough
decision.
Passengers tackles a premise that is very far from human possibility. Although a sci-fi, it understandably tries to
justify the science behind the fantasy. But then again, the challenge lies on
its effectiveness to suspend disbelief of the audience – but the even more
problematic humanness of the entire storyline and uninspired mounting of
emotional thread fail to make the picture at the very least, believable. The
film utterly fails to maximize the grand setting and elaborate CGIs with its
thinly layered story arcs. Lawrence and Pratt make a great pair though and both
look great on screen given the limitations of the material. The real problem of
the film is its structure itself. It apparently lacks the heart in what it
really wants to say about human nature in general. The motivations and actions
of the characters seem to be no more than functional and the reconciliations
appear to be no more than obligatory. In
the end, the audience feels nothing for the characters, even for all its
passengers.
No man is an
island. The film works on this adage as justification for its character’s
decisions. However, looking at his
motivations on the moral context, it is indeed no doubt that his action is an
ultimate act of selfishness without regard to the well-being of the other.
While growing and dying old alone seem to be a tragedy in itself, humans have
the capacity to accept and endure suffering if that would be his or her fate.
Altering one’s fate in an artificial and inhuman way is definitely a grave
offense against the other person. Even the romance in the Passengers seems to be manipulated and staged for there is
deception from the very beginning. Perhaps the film tries to justify Jim’s acts
of purifying his intentions but even the film’s resolution does not give enough
justice at all. Does the end to love really justify the means to deceive? Was
there really love to begin with? Or is it just a product of fear of growing and
dying old alone? The film in its entirety plays God. They are all manipulating
human possibilities without regard for the divine. It seems God is absent in
the outer space. The characters’ heroic
acts for the greater good are commendable as well as their effort to bring life
and nature life in the spacecraft is amazing. Forgiveness comes sooner because
of love. But then, love is being confused with lust in the film and there was
no regard for procreation which adds more confusion with the film’s real
intention. But if there is one apparent moral the film depicts it would be the
fact that humans are not perfect. Only God is. And when humans start to believe
that they are perfect and can even create and manipulate new life through their
own effort and intelligence that would be the start of their own downfall. For
some graphic nudity and sexual content, CINEMA deems the film may be
appropriate only to audiences aged 14 and above.
