Jennifer Lawrence seems out of place in space...

Rating: 5/10 (15 January 2017)

The Starship Avalon, in the midst of its 120-year journey from Earth to a colony planet known as Homestead II, suffers a collision in space which prematurely awakens one of its 5,000 passengers (Chris Pratt). With 90 years to go before reaching his destination, Pratt is sure to die of old age on the spaceship, so--with a guilty conscience--he awakens another passenger from hibernation, a pretty female writer. With such an engaging 30-minute opening, detailing Pratt's daily adventures while being the only person awake on the huge ship (and baring his innermost thoughts to a pleasant robotic bartender), one gets the sinking feeling screenwriter Jon Spaihts won't be able to keep up the momentum for long. True enough, for as soon as Jennifer Lawrence is awakened--a sleeping beauty aptly named Aurora--the film slips into formula (not necessarily a science fiction formula, more like a man and woman against the elements formula) that feels staid and familiar (they bicker and make up like the shipwrecked kids from "The Blue Lagoon"). Lawrence isn't convincing, anyway, as a New Yorker on her way to another planet--her bright, inquisitive personality is so of-the-moment and earthbound that to place her on-board this Starship is an automatic mismatch of actress and milieu. The special effects, art direction and design of "Passengers" are impressive but, with such a rote plot, one wishes to jump ship long before Homestead II comes into view. ** from ****