Product Description

A burned-out journalist assumes the identity of a dead man and embarks on a dangerous charade, including meetings with gun runners and an affair with a mysterious young woman.

Originally released in 1975, Sony Pictures Classics re-releases Antonioni's suspenseful and haunting portrait of a drained journalist whose deliverance is an identity exchange with a dead man. He embarks on a treacherous journey through Africa, Spain, Germany, England, Spain.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #18054 in DVD
• Brand: Sony
• Released on: 2006-04-25
• Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
• Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
• Formats: Color, DVD, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English, French, German, Spanish
• Subtitled in: English, Spanish, French, Portuguese, Chinese, Thai
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: 1.00 pounds
• Running time: 126 minutes

Amazon.com
The Passenger is one of those movies that is all about the vision of the director, in this case, screen legend Michelangelo Antonioni. Starring none other than Jack Nicholson, and featuring a plot billed as an international romantic thriller, The Passenger defies expectations by turning the genre on its head, making the characters and the story secondary to theme and tone. London-based Journalist David Locke (Nicholson) is working in North Africa when a fellow traveler by the name of David Robertson, who looks remarkably like him, happens to die suddenly. Burned out and depleted, Locke decides to assume the dead man’s identity, drops everything, and starts again as a new man with a new life. With no idea of who Robertson was or what he did for a living, Locke uses Robertson’s datebook as a guide as he travels through Europe and Africa, takes meetings with people he finds out are gun runners, and ends up falling for a beautiful young woman (Maria Schneider). As Robertson, David Locke thinks he has found an exhilirating new freedom, but the fact is he's in over his head: there are people looking for him and his life could be in danger.

The movie is a thriller in structure only. While designed for suspense, it’s just a premise for Antonioni to explore on themes of identity, humankind’s seemingly futile relationship to the world around us, and isolation. For Antonioni, the action is the means by which the image unfolds, and not the other way around. The actors and the plot are set pieces, simply smaller means to a larger end, and the image and atmosphere supersede all else. A slow pace, long, lingering shots, a focus on emptiness, and a detached, almost brutally objective point of view are the trademarks on full display here. Especially notable is the stunning seven-minute long shot in the final scene, one of the most famous in cinema history, which Nicholson, in his commentary, tags as an "Antonioni joke." It caps a crowning achievement by one of the big screen’s most visionary directors.

On the DVD:
The commentaries are most definitely welcome guides, and those looking for a way into the movie and into Antonioni’s head will really enjoy them. Jack Nicholson provides one commentary track where he generously shares his memories of the shoot, his thoughts on the movie thirty years on, and lets out the secret of how they managed to get the camera through the bars on the window for that seven-minute shot in the last scene. On the second commentary track, journalist Aurora Irvine and screenwriter Mark Peploe offer more of a wide-angle lens view of the movie and its place in history. Both are insightful narratives—Nicholson’s is particularly enjoyable--and make excellent additions to the DVD. --Daniel Vancini

Customer Reviews

A removal from what we call living...
Unlike Antonioni's two attempts at capturing the personal alienation brought about by the cultural changes of the 60s--Zabriskie Point and Blow-Up--The Passenger is a signficantly more grounded film that focuses as well on alienation, but uses a diversity of foreign cultures to underline one man's alienation from life regardless of location.

The two films prior to The Passenger, also set outside the director's native country, but now obviously dated, tried using specific individual cultural settings (America and England) to highlight the emptiness of human behavior in the face of shallow cultural values. The Passenger is a decidedly more timeless film because instead of focusing on a specific culture, it wisely focuses on an individual, a globe-trotting reporter, whose own focus is on war and revolution in third world nations.

David Locke begins to grow weary of his life that constantly exposes him to the negative forces between and within nations all too common in today's world (another reason this film is still tremendously fresh and powerful today). When another man with a similar appearance suddenly dies in a small remote African village hotel Locke himself is staying in, he assumes the other man's (Robertson's) identity and follows an international trail to keep the appointments in Robertson's little black book. This takes him from Africa to Germany to Spain.

Without giving too much away here, it becomes all too clear that Locke--now Robertson--wants to escape himself. Antonioni, in collaboration with brilliant scripter Mark Peploe, moves us with Locke/Robertson from place to place as he blindly follows his nose, or, more accurately, runs from other noses following him--one of which is his own. Another of them belongs to his wife who begins to believe her husband is still alive somewhere. Still others are those of the police. But the most dangerous noses are those of some of the same people Locke, while a reporter, passively interviewed. Now, as Robertson, his role is not so passive anymore.

In his haste to escape, Locke finds that Robertson was involved in a dangerous business that could result in the ultimate escape. This is a great film that fuses thriller elements with drama that penetrates because we see and understand what Locke thinks and does. Jack Nicholson's portrait of the escapee is right on the money; he sounds, at least half the time, as though he's not really sure that what he's saying is true, or that he can believe it--exactly what someone running from himself would sound like.

Antonioni emphasizes the isolation of people from each other in interesting visual ways. He often shoots scenes with the camera at a noticeable distance from the actors; we are physically removed from the action, and with this distance, there is the distinct feeling of what we see as observers being not really action, but a kind of indistinct or unclear version of action. As well, the camera intermittently closes up on Locke when he is doing nothing, or waiting, or is stuck in a rut (literally, in a sand rut when his vehicle is snagged in the African desert). These close-ups are a very effective counerpart to the distance shots; the first removes us from what could possibly be critical action, and the second hits us in the face with the opposite.

A real shame this is not on DVD. As of this writing (October 2003), the only DVD version is a Japanese Region 2 NTSC disc, very hard to find.

One of the best films ever made.
Jack Nicholson plays David Locke, a successful but jaded reporter in a mid life crisis. His mixed up mid Atlantic origins, failing marriage and dissatisfaction with his work come to a head in a small hotel in an obscure town in a war torn African country. The only other guest is the enigmatic business man Mr Robertson who confesses to having no family or friends only a list of appointments. The mid-life crisis fantasy turns into reality for Locke when Robertson dies from a heart attack. Locke switches passport photos, assumes the other man's identity and heads off to keep the apointments.

The list of apointments in the dead man's diary lead Locke on a journey across Europe. He is pursued by a team of assassins who, believing him to be the real Mr Robertson, want to kill the man selling guns to the rebels in their country. Also on the trail are the police together with his wife who is the only other person in the film to have realised the identity swap. Despite the state of her marriage, (she has taken a lover) she still cares about him and wants to warn about the danger that he faces.

No mid life crisis film would be complete without the younger woman with beautiful eyes and no past herself who falls for the leading man. Maria Schneider plays this role very well providing both an innocent acceptance and a sophisticated understanding of Locke's game.

Very few actors could have played the part of Locke as well as Nicholson. He brings an air of detachment to the part that fits in with the character's behaviour. He is taking part in another man's life but as a spectator.

As well as the storyline, the film is shot with the artistic poise and exquisite technique that I always enjoy when I see the work of director Antonioni. From the scenes in the African dessert to the final moments in a small sun baked Spanish town, the film is a joy to view. At the end of the film comes one single camera shot that is quite magical. The scene starts in Nicholson's hotel room and slowly homes in on the barred window. We zoom towards the window and then fly out through the bars into the square outside. Then slowly, the camera, now clearly on the other side of the bars pans around the square before returning to view the window from the outside. At the time, this was the longest and technically the most demanding camera shot ever attempted.

"People disappear every day ... "
Jack Nicholson says the making of Michelangelo Antonioni's "The Passenger" was "the biggest adventure in filming I ever had in my life." That's saying plenty, and probably explains why the actor did his first solo commentary for the DVD. Nicholson clearly remains a disciple of his "Passenger" director.

The actor frets about talking over some of the master's mysterioso scenes, apologizing for "distracting" viewers. No worries -- Nicholson is great company, of course, and his memories of making "The Passenger" are rich and fairly detailed.

The restored "Passenger" made the rounds of art houses last fall. The film needs to be seen on a cinema screen but it's rewarding on DVD as well. Repeat viewings pay off as the movie reveals more of its secrets with every spin.

A second commentary track comes from screenwriter Mark Peploe ("The Sheltering Sky"), who based the tale on his experiences as a docu maker. Peploe's talk drags at times, but if you want to dig into the movie he provides a lot of detail. The journalist who shares the track just saw the film for the first time and adds nothing.

The remastered "Passenger" looks quite good for a 1970s movie, its images wear-free and mostly easy on the eyes -- a tad stringent or sun-bleached on occasion, probably by design. Images are widescreen, of course, enhanced for 16x9 monitors. The two-channel audio is good enough.