federovsky This was the first art film I ever saw, and probably also the first time I'd seen Jack Nicholson. It made a big impression. I'd never seen a film that pondered things like this, gave you opportunity to experience feelings in real-time. I took it that Antonioni invented this sort of movie - possibly even invented the art-movie genre.There's a lot that doesn't add up here. When I see subtle ambiguities, unexplained depths, and especially questions of identity, I immediately look for sexual ambivalence - and often I find it. First, there's the title. Some people think the 'passenger' is Maria Schneider, or that it relates to Nicholson using the dead man's plane ticket. What I get is that Nicholson's hidden, secret, suppressed inner self was a kind of passenger in his own official, external life, the life he didn't want. That indicates only one thing to me. Other clues? He sees his wife later without any pangs of remorse or sentimentality - simply runs away; he has an adopted child (why adopted?); he doesn't expose the lies of the politicians he interviews (saying 'those are the rules'). These may all be extremely subtle hints about the man's secret sexual identity. Sure, he hooks up with tasty gamine Maria Schneider, but that's a smokescreen to puts us off the scent - and there is always a smokescreen because it's essential to the point of the film that no one fully understands it - but note that there was no overt sexual encounter between them - quite significant in its omission. So there you are. It works for me, and if I am right, we are now probably the first people to fully understand what this film is about. So how good is it? We start out in the African desert with a schematic series of silent encounters, miscommunications, words falling flat in the emptiness, the lethargy of heat, a quasi Paul Bowles feel of lurking malice. So far so good. Atmosphere. Images. Metaphor. Meaning. The desert is symbolic and significant - exactly as it was in the life of that that other (married) gay journalist Bruce Chatwin. Then, Nicholson's character switches identity with a dead man (without reason, because it is not expressible), dons a naff seventies brown suit with flared trousers, and we land in a silly intrigue relating to the dead man's job. All those scenes with the gun-runners, the wife, and the television studio boss are redundant and should have been ditched. It's a relief when he and Maria Schneider hit the road because that's when the film really finds itself: illicit freedom, the escape from the person you don't want to be. That ought to have been the key theme throughout and I don't think Antonioni really got to grips with it properly. He was too keen to take us round Gaudi's buildings in Barcelona for one thing.I don't know what Antonioni was thinking of in leaving Italy. Probably he just wanted to be part of a bigger, trendier scene. But whereas Bertolucci found new depth in things like Last Tango in Paris, Antonioni forgot quite a lot of what he knew about cinema: of reality vs silliness, of story vs meaning, of style vs substance. He was like one of those pop singers (Faye Wong comes to mind) who sound great in their own language, but rotten in English.After all these years I'm less impressed with The Passenger than I was before. Antonioni seems to be a man of limited interests (basically two: alienation and architecture), and it's all there is here again. The famous final scene must have been original at the time but now looks vaguely silly. Lots of weak moments, and only a few great ones.

tomsview Although I had seen Michelangelo Antonioni's "The Passenger" when it first appeared on television in the late 70's, I was disappointed that it didn't seem to measure up to "Blowup", and pretty much forgot about it.However, there have been so many references to the film over the years, especially when the conversation turns to movies with ambiguous plots and obscure endings, that I decided to give it another go.I still don't think it has the sharpness or style of "Blowup", but I now appreciate it more, and definitely love that unresolved ending. However, it has a flaw, and it weakens the film – it's a mistake that Hitchcock would never have made.Jack Nicolson plays David Locke, a reporter seeking to interview rebel leaders in North Africa. He is disillusioned with just about everything, before suddenly seeing a chance at a new life. When David Robertson (Charles Mulvehill), a man who looks uncannily like him, dies of a heart attack in the same hotel, Locke swaps identities with him.Although he gets away with it, he begins to realise that Robertson is an illegal arms dealer, and is involved with dangerous people. As he travels from Africa to London and then on to Spain, the movie becomes a waiting game to see which of Jack's pasts will catch up with him first.And what do I think is the flaw in the film? It's all in the timing. More than half way through the movie, Locke meets Maria Schneider's character, billed simply as 'Girl'. Schneider brings such an aura of sexual tension to the film that you realise just how flat the first half has been. Antonioni should have brought her in far earlier.What an amazing impact she has, whether it's memories of her character from "Last Tango in Paris" or simply her enigmatic sultriness, she gives the film a charge of energy. The best scenes in "The Passenger" come from the air of expectation built up around Jack Nicholson's double identities and the presence of Maria Schneider.The movie was made in 1975 and, as was the vogue in many European and Hollywood movies at the time, romanticises the revolutionaries and guerrillas. However, divorced from the headlines and the mood of the 70's, the back-story of "The Passenger" seems overly contrived.For anyone who has not seen the "The Passenger", but been exposed to all the tricky plots in films over the intervening years, you could be forgiven for wondering what all the fuss was about. The film generated a great deal of analysis about the idea of escaping one's identity, but surely more has been read into it than could ever have been intended.Nonetheless, "The Passenger" still has the unique pairing of Nicholson and Schneider, and that deliciously ambiguous ending.

blanche-2 Lately I just haven't been able to hit it right with my film rentals. This is yet another example.Lest all of you find me an idiot, I'll say up front that I really love Blow-Up, also from this team, along with dozens of other films. This just wasn't one of them.The story is that David Locke (Jack Nicholson), a reporter, is sent to Africa to write about activities there. While in a cheap hotel, he finds the dead body of someone he knows slightly, a man named Robertson. Locke is obviously miserable with his life because he takes this man's identity, puts the dead body in his room, and everyone thinks he's the one who died.This man, Robertson, had an airport locker number written down -- obviously this is before 9/11, when they got rid of the lockers. Inside Robertson finds a bunch of papers with gun drawings, and later he is approached by two men who ask them for the papers. Turns out Robertson was running guns and being paid a large amount of money.Robertson/Locke picks up with a young woman (Maria Schneider) who tags along with him. When he finds out that a reporter friend of Locke's is looking for him, Robertson, he gets the girl to help him escape. They take off together.However, Locke's wife has discovered the switch and everyone is after him -- the terrorists want Robertson, Locke's wife wants to know what's going on, and she has the police with her.This had the makings of an exciting story but instead it was long, boring, without much dialogue, but with beautifully framed shots and interesting locations, plus a good performance by Nicholson.I freely admit I don't understand the appeal of a film like this. It had no energy, no pulse, and I didn't feel anything for the characters. It's always films like this that get huge scores on IMDb and are hailed as masterpieces. To me, No Country for Old Men was a masterpiece, A Man Escaped is a masterpiece, Autumn Sonata, Ace in the Hole, The Dead, Fargo, so many others, but alas, not this one. I guess I'm not deep enough.

Theo Robertson David Locke a journalist covering the civil war in Chad meets an Englishman called Robertson . Turning up at his hotel room the next morning Locke finds Robertson dead and decides to steal his identity . As it turns out Robertson's past catches up with Locke which eventually threatens his life You might remember this turning up on BBC2 one night in the mid 1980s and probably thought along the lines of " Wow a mid 1970s thriller starring Jack Nicholson . I'll lock the doors , close the curtains and take the phone of the hook " I can feel your pain because in those days there was no internet and no IMDb which would have warned you that producer Carlo Ponti and Michelangelo Antonioni previously gave us BLOW UP , one of the most dire pretentious films of its era . In short Antonnioni doesn't concern himself with narrative he's an auteur who is only concerned with enigma to bamboozle his audience so they can stroke their chins throughout the running time then at the end quickly rise to their feet , applaud and shout " magnificent " . I too spent the whole movie stroking my chin , rubbing my eyes , yawning then when the end credits started I rose to my feet and said " Well done , you had Jack Nicholson playing a bad man called Robertson and you literally bored me to death . That is some type of genius . Bravo " In the Summer of 2013 we've seen one Hollywood blockbuster flop one after the other so some might claim there might be a niche for films like THE PASSENGER . They're not entirely wrong because if no one wants to watch a film in the cinema then they don't want to watch a film in the cinema but is a selling point to a film that it's anti-Hollywood blockbuster a good enough reason for watching it ? I think that is a rhetorical question The selling point to THE PASSENGER is not stardom but is a film dealing with mystery , enigma , mid life crisis and profound allegorical questions on the nature of identity . All sorts of questions are being asked by the director to the audience . The climatic scene isn't what happened to Locke/Robertson but what is happening to every individual that has existed ? In short it's one of those movies that is classed as " essential " on academic film courses . After all you're not supposed to say " This is one of the most tedious film experiences I have ever suffered " but " The climatic scene that has a shot length of almost eight minutes reminded me of the cinema of Bela Tarr " which leaves me nostalgic for the films of Bela Lugosi