1. DuncanK.

   10

   [***SPOILERS***] The Passenger stars Jack Nicholson as David Locke, a journalist who has reached a point of extreme frustration during the process of making a documentary. Fundamentally unhappy with his own life, he discovers a fellow hotel guest dead in his room and decides to abandon his identity and revive the corpse’s. To the hotel clerk Locke says, “I’d like to inquire about flights.” This of course has a double meaning. He is literally interested in flights, but he would also like to escape his past. The theme of identity and Locke’s name itself immediately recall the most essential writings of John Locke. He believed in the concept of the tabula rasa or blank slate and that it was our experiences that defined us as people. While responding to a comment that all places are the same, Nicholson’s character argues that it’s actually the people that are the same. That everyone conforms to a specific and rigid matrix of societal construction. This makes sense in terms of John Locke’s philosophy as the slate that is the human psyche is filled with these cultural archetypes. Nicholson’s character is desperate to escape this. He wants to be an individual, something new. Beyond this though, he wants to stay blank. In what is perhaps the film’s most joyous moment the Girl asks Locke what he’s running from. He tells her to turn her back to the front of the car. What occurs next is an instant of spontaneous elation as she watches the road rush away behind them. The interesting thing is that she is in fact watching the past during this moment. By facing her previous experience (which Locke refuses to do) she is happy. Locke is asked more than once whether he thinks a landscape is beautiful. In one case he answers no, in another he distractedly answers yes but doesn’t take the time to look around. He intentionally avoids absorbing beauty or new experience in an effort to remain in a constant state of rebirth. These themes are culminated in the story of the blind man towards the end. If I had any doubts about this merits of this film during its run time they were shattered by the final shot. It’s of such masterful technical merit that it’s almost hard to concentrate on what actually occurring on screen. As this seven minute shot ends it becomes clear that The Passenger is a haunting masterpiece that dissects the most cardinal notions of personal and social identity.… Expand

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2. ClintH.

   4

   I love Blow-Up and L'Avventura. I know my Antonioni, and his tendency to take big plot points and never follow through with them. But Nicholson is just a little too wooden and this is just way too boring.… Expand

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3. Ben

   2

   Antonioni was a real landscape fetishist in this one. It's interesting to note the critical reaction 30 years where a film a dull and leaden as this one was hailed for its mainstream accessibility.… Expand

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