Any vastly expensive movie that spends a decade in development hell is sure to be greeted with suspicion, but casting a pair of A-list superstars in the lead roles did at least ensure 2016’s Passengers avoided the ignominy of bombing at the box office.
Not that it was a runaway success, though, with the $150 million sci-fi romance topping out at $303 million in ticket sales, not a great return for an ambitious intergalactic love story that revolved around Chris Pratt and Jennifer Lawrence. Then again, maybe its disappointing performance was down to the fact it wasn’t very good.
Having cycled through several writers, directors, and stars on its way to the big screen, Passengers ended up securing a lowly 30 percent score on Rotten Tomatoes, with Lawrence revealing that Adele of all people had warned her against signing on for the project in the first place, and maybe she should have listened.
The other notable thing about the film is that it’s a lot creepier than anyone intended, with the narrative coming under fire for the central plot effectively being Pratt deciding to ruin his co-star’s life by waking her up from suspended animation for no other reason than he’s bored and lonely, and she’s attractive. In fact, some folks have even suggested that Passengers would have been much better as a sinister psychological thriller, which is a solid argument.
Either way, the interminably uninteresting snoozefest has decided to have a reawakening of its own, with FlixPatrol naming it as not just one of the most-watched features on Prime Video, but on iTunes and Rakuten, too.