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Passenger, The (re-release)
Sony Pictures Classics

6.7 based on 20 reviews Read critic reviews How did we calculate this? based on 25 votes Read user comments Rate this movie

FILM:

• Beyond the Clouds
• Eros

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MPAA RATING: PG-13 for some violence, nudity and language

Starring Jack Nicholson, Maria Schneider, Jenny Runacre, Ian Hendry, Steven Berkoff, Ambroise Bia, José María Caffarel, and James Campbell

Originally released in 1975, The Passenger is, on the simplest level, a suspense story about a man trying to escape his own life. This haunting film is a portrait of a drained journalist, played by Jack Nicholson, whose deliverance is an identity exchange with a dead man. The film was shot on location and takes Nicholson on an incredible journey through Africa, Spain, Germany and England. (Sony Pictures Classics)

GENRE(S):	Drama
WRITTEN BY:	Michelangelo Antonioni Peter Wollen Mark Peploe (also story)
DIRECTED BY:	Michelangelo Antonioni
RELEASE DATE:	DVD: April 25, 2006  Video: August 8, 1990  Theatrical: October 28, 2005
RUNNING TIME:	119 minutes, Color
ORIGIN:	France / Italy / USA / Spain

Nominated, Golden Palm, 1975 Cannes Film Festival

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

100

TV Guide Staff (Not credited)

Visually stunning adventure. (Review of Original Release)

100

Chicago Reader Don Drucker

A masterpiece, one of Michelangelo Antonioni's finest works. (Review of Original Release)

100

Film Threat Phil Hall

Whereas "Cuckoo’s Nest" is a brilliantly over-the-top accomplishment, The Passenger is more brilliant with the most effortless underplaying one can ever hope to witness on screen.

100

Chicago Tribune Michael Wilmington

Still packs a wallop. It's also a movie with no easy passage to its dark heart.

100

Boston Globe Ty Burr

What's most shocking about The Passenger 30 years later? Seeing Jack Nicholson at the lean, sardonic height of his youthful powers? Finding a Michelangelo Antonioni movie with an actual plot?

100

San Francisco Chronicle G. Allen Johnson

A rare chance to see a major cinematic work on the big screen.

100

Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold

Antonioni's moviemaking panache and distinctive narrative rhythm rarely have seemed so enticing and satisfying.

100

Christian Science Monitor Peter Rainer

The film's final seven-minute shot is one of the great denouements in film history.

100

Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea

A visually dazzling mood piece.

91

Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman

The Passenger isn't finally the masterpiece some have made it out to be, but it retains a singular intrigue: It's the first, and probably the last, thriller ever made about depression.

90

The New York Times Vincent Canby

No other performer (Jack Nicholson) in an Antonioni film, except Jeanne Moreau in "La Notte," has so gracefully submitted to Mr. Antonioni and survived intact. (Review of Original Release)

90

Variety Staff (Not credited)

Nicholson plays the character with personal flair, as penetrating as Antonioni's handling of the film. (Review of Original Release)

88

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

Intended as a thriller of sorts, although Antonioni is, as always, too deeply involved in the angst of his characters to bother much with the story. (Review of Original Release)

88

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

The script, co-written by Antonioni and Peter Wollen, focuses on a TV journalist (a superb Jack Nicholson).

83

Portland Oregonian Shawn Levy

It's refreshing that something once considered terribly new and modern can still feel contemporary three decades later.

80

Los Angeles Times Carina Chocano

A fascinating reflection of the era when it was made; but a starker indictment still of what film culture has become. In 1975, The Passenger was a night at the movies.

80

Village Voice J. Hoberman

The Passenger is a relic of that moment in international co-production when famous European auteurs hitched their wagons to hip and eager Hollywood stars.

80

Salon.com Andrew O'Hehir

In casting Jack Nicholson as the jaded Anglo-American journalist who abandons his previous life during a trip to Africa and adopts a dangerous new identity, Antonioni was working with a more powerful and charismatic actor than he has before or since. The result is something like a glamorous thriller or a disaster film in slow motion.

80

Empire David Parkinson

A bleak and moving drama with reflective performance from Jack Nicolson.

50

Dallas Observer Robert Wilonsky

It reminds one of "The Constant Gardener," another globetrotting thriller bereft of thrills that looks more important in retrospect than on the screen. Certainly, one man's trash is another man's masterpiece, and more power to the viewer who can stick with this deadpan travelogue and make it to the ending that actually satisfies.

The average user rating for this movie is 6.7 (out of 10) based on 25 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

bala b. gave it a9:
One of the best film in cinematic narration

Stephen S. gave it a9:
Surely Antonioni and Nicholson could not possibly have imagined how well this film would serve their respective reputations a generation later! Cherish Schneider’s exact work, and relish the early Nicholson, acting not leering. His character takes on a big chance, ultimately a losing chance, by impulsively assuming a dead man’s identity. Antonioni too takes big chances, using story elements that now turn out to be a little dated, repeating his usual tropes of few people inhabiting great languid slabs of time and territory. Yet the poetic result is winning, unlike the disorder of his previous English-language piece Zabriskie Point. An object lesson here is that even the greatest artist needs an unplanned slice of luck and serendipity in order to create a lasting, coherent work of art.

Duncan K. gave it a10:
[***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.

Robert H. gave it a6:
pretty antonioni travelogue has plot so uninteresting that i spent the whole film hoping maria schneider would take her clothes off.

Andrew C. gave it a10:
The crafting of this film is pure perfection. The pace is slow, but you surrender yourself to it, and your consciousness just sinks into the film. An immensely enjoyable experience. The shots and cinematography are absolutely stunning.

Vito G. gave it a1:
Boring, boring, boring, like all Antonioni's film. Nothing happens and you wouldn't care if it did. I would call it pretentious but it doesn't even pretend to be about anything. Of course, the critics love it.

Delysid gave it a10:
I saw "The Passenger" in a film class at university years ago, and myself along with most others in the class found it to be one of the best things we saw during the whole 8 month class of two evenings a week, 5 hours a night. That's a lot of films, all of them classics, and "The Passenger" was among the top 3 for me.

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