Passengers

Two acting superstars fly through space, have adventures and find their way to each other despite a repulsive lie. And that's it. Passengers gives a lot of space to Chris Pratt and Jennifer Lawrence, and both use it to no end, but unfortunately they rely more for charisma than interesting characters. The chemistry between the characters and the love line is the most interesting thing about their story, but the problem is that it takes up about a third of the film and without it Passengers runs out of breath. And the finale itself is downright bad. Pratt and Lawrence, however, try to push it forward at all times. What's next? Nice production design, good visual effects and some pretty thrilling scenes. So all in all, a pretty solid film, but I would have expected more from two of the most popular acting faces of our time. (05/15/2017)

A hi-tech technological treat in the thrall of routine, passionless melodrama, in which the filmmakers figured that if they couldn't pull off the philosophy or the careful mating call, a bit of spectacular fire at the end would save them. The opening twenty minutes are from another world and the finale from a well-known universe where hysterical laughter can be heard. (10/02/2017)

A textbook sci-fi romance. A-grade actors, decent effects and if at the end the screenplay hadn’t begun freewheeling so unoriginally, the movie could have been excellent. In retrospect I’m disappointed that I had already learned of a fundamental twist (from the time when Keanu Reaves was meant to play Jim) which the trailers sensibly kept secret. P.S: Andy Garcia appears for precisely three seconds. (01/08/2017)

Passengers is a nicely done “exciting sci-fi romance” for which the most important thing is that the color of the costumes matches the eyes of the central duo. The set designs and visuals were inspired by everything from 2001 (the ship’s interiors) to Gravity (flying outside of the ship), while adding a nice idea with a zero-gravity pool. It’s a pleasant movie for the target audience of The Hunger Games. However, only about 30% of the hugely promising premise was actually used. I’d like to see this made by Inárritu or a young Ridley… (01/10/2017)

The only film of its kind, a creatively grasped and logically developed romance in the cinephile milieu of the lovers of 2001: A Space Odyssey or Alien. The audience's enthusiasm for the comfort and limitless possibilities of a closed futuristic world is impressively confronted with an emerging moral dilemma, while the precisely rhythmic narrative seamlessly connects the lines of the overarching sci-fi conflict with the internal conflicts and relationships of the awakened characters. Laurence Fishburne's character may be a very violently executed scripted interlude whose sole purpose is to nudge the central pair towards resolving technical glitches, and the ending is too Hollywood, but the overall enthusiasm still far outweighs that, and not just because of the likeable Pratt and the beautiful Jennifer, who would be a turn-on for any guy with even a minimal sex drive, but also thanks to the delightful cinematic references, led by bartender Michael Sheen a.k.a. Lloyd from Kubrick's The Shining, who instantly ranks as one of the most endearing figures in the history of bartending and sci-fi. Anyone who talks about insanely wasted potential must have the most vivid imagination since Tolkien, 85% (02/27/2017)