Passengers

Passengers is a 2016 movie starring Chris Pratt and Jennifer Lawrence. The movie is partly a sci-fi space drama, partly an action movie, partly a romantic drama, and partly an ethical thought experiment. Pratt stars as Jim Preston, a mechanical engineer aboard a spaceship called The Avalon, traveling from Earth to a new, habitable planet 60 light-years away from Earth. Technology has advanced to the point where the trip only takes 120 years, so the passengers aboard the ship are put in a state of suspended animation for most of the trip with different passengers being awakened in stages when the ship is within a couple of years of its destination. During the voyage, the ship is struck by a wayward asteroid, which damages the ship and causes Preston to be awakened 90 years too early. For the first portion of the movie, it is just Pratt and Michael Sheen (who plays the ship's computer/butler, Arthur). Then, over the course of the movie, Jennifer Lawrence's character, Aurora Lane is awakened, as is Lawrence Fishburne's character, Gus, who is the ship's deck officer. The movie transitions from a lost at-sea castaway kind of movie, to a romance movie, to a disaster movie all within the span of nearly four hours. For those who get the 4K blu-ray set, there are three discs. The 4k-UHD disc just has the movie, a 3D-Blu-Ray disc that again just has the movie, and a regular blu-ray disc that has the movie and all of the extras. The extras include four different making-of featurettes that range in length from four minutes to just over eleven minutes. Then there are about ten minutes of deleted scenes, a series of fake commercials promoting travel on The Avalon, a gag reel, and trailers for other movies. So, a decent amount is there for people who like watching the extras. The A/V quality of the UHD disc is wonderful, and the movie has a ton of great CGI visuals. Ultimately, the movie is long but does not really feel as long as it is. It is paced very well, and while the story is definitely a bit predictable in parts, it is entertaining. Given that Pratt has to carry the first portion of the movie on his own, with only a handful of scenes with Michael Sheen playing opposite him, he does a very good job portraying a guy who slowly starts to go crazy. Jennifer Lawrence does a good job with her character once she "comes to life" and the action portion of the movie is good as well. It is definitely worth the time to watch.

I watched this movie with some friends and, while I very much enjoyed it, not everyone agreed with me. Some thought it moved too slowly in the beginning and didn't really pick up the pace until the last third of the movie. Others questioned the science (someone always does) while one of my friends thought Chris Pratt was miscast as the mechanical engineer who wakes up too early while in a hibernation pod on a ship bound for a new planet. In truth, I understand their complaints. I just don't agree with them. "Passengers" does start slowly, especially when compared to other science fiction films that often begin with a planet exploding or a battle between giant starships. I would argue, however, that it needs to do so in order to help viewers feel just how alone Pratt's character truly is and just how desperate he feels when he realizes that he will die before the ship reaches its destination. There are 4,999 other passengers on this voyage and nearly 300 crew members but they are all in deep hibernation while he alone roams the giant starship. His only companion, an android bartender (played brilliantly by Michael Sheen) helps to take some of the edge off his profound loneliness but cannot take the place of another human being. Pratt has carved a niche in Hollywood as an action hero and I understand why some people might disagree with the choice to cast him as an engineer. However, the fact that his character is a mechanical engineer - someone who works not only with his brain but also his hands - makes him a good choice for the role, in my opinion. His character is not painted as an intellectual but, rather, as a practical man who knows how to fix things; a man who decides to leave Earth's friendly confines because there is little or nothing for him to do in a throw-away society. For that reason, Pratt seems like an ideal choice for the role as a result. Casting him as a particle physicist wouldn't work, but casting him as a super handyman does. As for the science: Perhaps my friends who questioned it are right. I wouldn't know because I am not a scientist, just a writer of mystery novels. However, I would argue in my defense that what science there is on display in the movie is effective because it helps to (a) move the story along and (b) provides a high degree of dramatic tension when it's needed. The special effects in "Passengers" are first rate. The design of the ship - both its interior and exterior - is brilliant. The production team opted for a ship that, on the inside, resembles a luxury cruise liner. Given the fact that the ship is owned by a private mega-corporation, I think that's appropriate. Most science fiction films are military or industrial in nature. Thus, the spaceships that their characters flit about the galaxy in do not have a lot of frills: They are, in essence, the outer space versions of battleships and oil tankers. The "Avalon" is, by contrast, a ship designed to carry paying customers to a new world and is designed to get them there in luxury. Although I won't discuss the plot in any detail, because that would spoil the experience for those that have not yet seen this movie, I will say that I very much appreciated the writing. This is a film that, like any good story, is not one dimensional. In addition to their survival, its characters must deal with big thematic issues: Loneliness, betrayal, desperation, love, loss, and what is, at its core, murder are all woven into the script. Pratt and Jennifer Lawrence, as the woman who eventually becomes his human companion on the ship, are both skilled actors and they handle the emotions that deal with these themes very nicely. The direction is smooth and the cinematography is well done, adding subtle layers to the movie. In summary: Not your typical science fiction film but one that relies on character development and nuanced performances to make it work. And, for my money, it works brilliantly.

I'm not all that much into Sci-fi fantasy, and the original preview was just interesting enough, to get me started with the movie. I fully expected to turn it off about 1/3 into it, because that's how I roll with Sci-Fi and horror movies. However, the story in this movie progress enough, in enough unpredictable ways, that it kept my interest throughout. I wasn't really "on the edge of my seat" with suspense, but I wanted to see "what happens next?", and "how does this eventually turn out?". It's close enough to a 5-start flick that I gave in and gave it a rarely given, 5-stars. That said, there were parts that dragged a bit, and given the situation, the temper tantrum's of some characters, though somewhat predictable human reactions to given circumstances, seemed over the top for me. When one is isolated, no other help available, literally survival is at stake, and there are no clear solutions, hurt feelings and anger just wouldn't be a priority on my menu. Again, overall, great movie. Enjoy!

This movie has problems. Lots of problems. So many problems that one professional review I read said you couldn't even suspend disbelief to watch it, and I'll even agree with that. Just to begin... You have a ship travelling 120 years with no crew rotating to keep someone available. You have a ship with redundancy and ability to heal itself of virtually everything except the issues that facilitate the story. You have a "hollywood" meteor field with meteors feet apart instead of miles apart like they would be in reality. You have a ship with everyone in suspended animation with no way to put anyone back into it if need be. You have a ship travelling at half the speed of light that does a beautiful swooping slingshot off a red giant star over a few minutes, instead of the few seconds it would take at most, ignoring the fact you can't slingshot off a star. You have a massive ship that spins to produce g-force "gravity" where the gravity can be turned off and on like a light switch. You have a major ethical dilemma that is the whole focus of the movie, that they then hardly develop at all. You have three hibernation pod failures where the two characters they needed to survive come out just fine, and the one character that they only needed for a few minutes to propel the story along is fatally wounded by the pod failure. I could go on, and on, and on... So now you're wondering, why do I like this movie? I don't know! But it's great! I watched it twice. I guess it's just fun. Maybe it's the ship. It really is a "main" character itself of the movie, and I think it might be the most interesting and beautiful space ship I've ever seen in a movie. I could watch the movie again just for the scenes of the ship. Maybe despite the flaws, it's just such a great basic story concept, I still find it compelling. Whatever the reason, I thoroughly enjoyed this. If anything about it appeals to you, you should give it a try. I put it off until this year because of the negative reviews when it came out, and I'm sorry I did. Like me, you may just find it fun!

Let me start; there are some flaws with this movie; reasons why I shouldn't be giving it 5 stars, but it makes up for it in other areas by which I can safely say to anyone who likes a calm space drama; watch this one. I started to like Jennifer Lawrence since seeing her in Silver Linings Playbook, where she stepped out of the role of the heroine and into something more challenging. This movie is not a role where she really shines in, but she delivers a great performance in it. Chris Pratt is clearly more into his element here, as this is more a movie about him. A person destined to spend his life alone by accident with no chance of escaping that fate. That premise is good. The first half hour becomes a version of Castaway in outer space and this is where the movie is at its strongest. One person, alone on a spaceship with 5,000 people in cryogenic state, with 90 more years to fly to his destination (believe me, this is no spoiler). His most important decision is, does he want to be alone all his life? The set design is fantastic. It is way too polished to feel real; no dust, no smears of dirt... everything is spic and span clean. Sure, the little robots are there to thank for that, but it feels too... 'computery'. But, again, the retro, art-deco, and futuristic designs are amazing. It is clearly designed for a visual presentation only, technically none of the designs make real sense, so don't look to deep into the functionalities of everything. There are tons of holes in the story-line. Don't look to deep into this. Usually I would not say that as I tend to trip over these issues all the time. But with this movie it feels like we are watching a movie that never aimed to be something big, but rather a smaller movie that had the chance to become just that. But if you - just like I did - watch the trailer and expect a HAL-9000 kind of story, you might be disappointed. The main story is super simple, and is actually a back-drop to showcase a scenario; what IF you were indeed the last two people alive... what would you do? Somehow, I cannot shake the feeling that the writers have watched Sunshine from Danny Boyle a lot (If you haven't seen it and you like Passengers, try it, it is a more tense story-line), with a hint of 2001: A space odyssey. But, the film has enough elements to it to make it stand on its own. So, do you want to watch a more slow paced space drama, with some good moments, solid acting, some interesting concepts? Then Passengers is a pretty safe bet for a good 2 hours. And the 5 stars? - if you watch the movie just to have a good time, this definitely deserves it.

**Spoilers Ahead** Passengers incorporates beautiful CGI and a Robinson Cruso theme to push the plot of a future every-man mechanic traveling the stars to a new world to make his mark. Asteroids get in the way of his dream and he finds himself marooned on a deserted star ship with only an android bartender to keep him company. Jim, played by Chris Pratt, struggling with being trapped for a year alone on the ship, eventually breaks his own code of ethics and "wakes" another passenger, Auroa, played by Jennifer Lawrence, so he will not have to live out his life alone between the stars. The movie is essentially a morality tale and love story taking place in the heavens. It asks just long could you last by yourself knowing that you could "wake up" anyone you wanted. Would you suffer in silence or doom another to share your existence at relativistic speeds. The disappointing part of this movie comes at the end. Jim and Auroa face their life together with love and friendship, both knowing they will never reach their destination of Homestead II which still 88 years away. They both discover happiness on their journey to find happiness. Cut to the epilogue. The crew wakes up at the end of the remaining 88 years to find not a sleek clean concourse on their star ship, but a rustic world with trees, grass and all manner of wildlife within the titanium and carbon fiber confines of the hull. A voice over of Aurora states for posterity that together she and jim found a beautiful life together. What I really wanted to see was that beautiful life together. Yup, I became that invested in the Jim and Aurora. I wanted to see them face the challenges of living with each other. What were their struggles? Did they want to have children? Did they have children? Did they think of creating a generational star ship by waking some other passengers and getting busy? What were those challenges like? Imagine being the captain of the star ship waking up to find 50 people who were born on the ship while you slept. Oh, the possibilities.... It left me so frustrated that I felt like writing a short story of novella on what happened in those 88 years. That all being said, It is an enjoyable movie, both for the quality and thought put into the science of possible space travel (loved the shield) and for the characters themselves. Some people have argued that some science points don't add up. My first comment to these complaints is always: "It's a movie" But to argue their point : The part in the movie where the ship loses power, the arms immediately stop spinning and the ship loses gravity. My response - the rings are propelled by worm gears.The worm shaft can turn the gears but not vice versa, If the engine stops, the worm shaft stops spinning, braking the ring until it stops. Etc.

One of my favorite movies

I'm a huge 3D fan, so when I saw this included 4K, 3D, Blu-ray at a good price, I just jumped on it without ever having seen it before. Bad mistake. This is a one-time rental quality movie. The reviews from most critics were negative, but oddly, the user reviews seem to be positive and currently has a 7/10 on IMDb. The critics were right on this one. For someone who doesn't watch many films, they may enjoy this, but for the avid movie goer, the movie is so predictable, cheesy, and quite dull. No real smart thrills or twists. It's many ideas stolen from Wall-E (2008), Gravity (2013), Interstellar (2014), The Martian (2015)... but done on the IQ level of the movie Transformers; it seems like a grade school student wrote this film. The story is generic and uninspiring. The pacing is awful. It's just so cheesy and predictable ("Oh Mr Robot, please keep this a secret.... I'm positive you won't tell anyone, but I feel like telling you anyway just to get some twists going") - there is no shock value or real thrill to the film. The plot seems more like a short story TV episode where they dragged it out with pointless scenes like virtual dancing, basketball, and swimming. The movie probably would have worked as a 30 minute short film story, but it's dragged out to 2 hours of unexciting bad pacing fill-ins. The script was bad enough, but the casting is probably worse; Chris Patt and Jennifer Lawrence is like the most superficial horribly balanced combination ever. You just can't sympathize with them. There's also nothing romantic about the chemistry/setup with the characters, especially from the script - both have done really creepy actions. If they weren't attracted to each other physically, there is no redeeming factor for either of their actions. While Chris's action may be unforgivable, how could one fall in love with someone who goes complete psycho ape sh*t kicking their face and everything? I guess two psychotics are made for each other? It would have been more interesting to have Chris react differently towards the Bartender after the "incident", but a wasted opportunity yet again because the movie usually likes to play it safe. The film seems to be confused whether it wants to be a family film with a PG-13 rating. I saw this film in 3D projection, and you'd think even the most mundane scenes would still be more enjoyable because of the 3D advantage, but it wasn't. I know the movie "Gravity" actually has a pretty dull "story" as well, but at least in 3D, for that film was actually spectacular and thrilling experience. You usually can't go wrong with 3D and space, but neither the story or the 3D were exciting for me.

An excellent movie and fantastic transfer. The 4K (and BD) discs are region free and work perfectly on my Panansonic DP-UB820 (Region B) player. The picture quality on 4K is breathtaking and is one of the clearest, cleanest images I have seen on 4K.

fantascienza e romantico La cosa incredibile è come il film sia risultato piacevole con la presenza di soli due attori per quasi tutta la durata. Attori principali sono Jennifer Lawrence e Chris Pratt. Il film è ambientato nel futuro. L'enorme astronave Avalon, lunga più di un chilometro e totalmente automatizzata, sta effettuando un viaggio interstellare di 120 anni dal pianeta Terra alla colonia Homestead II portando a bordo 258 membri dell'equipaggio e 5 000 passeggeri, tutti sottoposti a sonno criogenico. I passeggeri sono coloni che, per vari motivi, hanno deciso di abbandonare la Terra e andare a stabilirsi sul nuovo pianeta, vergine e ricco di risorse. L’impatto con dei meteoriti causa dei malfunzionamenti. Il primo guasto avviene alla capsula criogenica che porta al risveglio, con 90 anni di anticipo rispetto al previsto, di uno dei passeggeri, l'ingegnere meccanico Jim Preston. Comincia il dramma di Jim che dovrà trascorrere il resto della sua vita da solo nell’astronave in quanto si è svegliato 90 anni prima del previsto. L’unico compagno di viaggio è l’androide barista Arthur.. Jim cerca delle soluzioni ma non è possibile riattivare la sua capsula. Comincia poi a curiosare sui passeggeri e si innamora di Aurora, una scrittrice giornalista. Ascolta le sue interviste e guarda i suoi video. Passa anche molto tempo vicino alla sua capsula. A un certo punto, dopo un anno di solitudine, comincia a maturare l’idea di svegliarla, facendo passare la cosa come a un guasto. E’ tormentato, ma la solitudine estrema lo porta poi a farlo. Aurora è anche lei angosciata al suo risveglio ma non c’è modo di tornare indietro… Nel tempo il rapporto comincia a consolidarsi. Proprio quando i due sembravano unirsi sentimentalmente, Aurora scopre che è stato Jim a causarlo. La reazione è rabbiosa…e i due continuano a vivere in modo separato. A un certo punto si verificano altri malfunzionamenti nell’astronave e molte cose cominciano a funzionare a intermittenza. Il capotecnico Gus Mancuso, si risveglia, ma è molto malato. Da quel momento la situazione diventa drammatica. Se non si risolve il problema l’astronave andrà in pezzi… Non vado oltre nella spiegazione ma il film è molto bello

J'ai acheté ce film en Blu-ray car je l'avais vu a la TV pour la première fois, je ne le connaissais pas et franchement super film, très belle histoire et super acteurs, surtout l'actrice qui est magnifique, je recommande a tout le monde, je l'ai pris en Blu-ray super image !

No está en español.

¡Estoy encantado con mi compra del Blu-ray de "Passengers"! La calidad de imagen y sonido es absolutamente impresionante. Se siente como si estuviera en el cine, pero desde la comodidad de mi hogar. Además, los extras y detrás de cámaras incluidos me brindaron una experiencia aún más enriquecedora, mostrando todo el trabajo y detalle que se invirtió en la creación de esta película. La historia es cautivadora, y tanto Jennifer Lawrence como Chris Pratt ofrecen actuaciones sobresalientes. Disfruté cada minuto de esta película y definitivamente la recomendaría a cualquier amante de la ciencia ficción y el romance. ¡Una excelente adición a mi colección de Blu-rays!