If it had sucked I could have said something like "want to go to sleep for 90 years? Just watch this movie!" But it's actually pretty passable. So...yeah.

Rating: 6/10 (15 March 2020)

The problem with high-concept stories is that they have a tendency to coast on their concept. But the thing about a great concept is that you can coast on them for quite a while and this movie has a good concept.
Plotwise at least, this sort of writes itself; Act 1: the solitude, Act 2: the courtship, Act 3: well, I think I'll let you find out.
I knew the basic premise going in but I still feel they missed a trick really establishing the main problem. our guy doesn't have that much in terms of personality but I liked him and enjoyed following on this emotional journey into the bowels of loneliness with only the automatons for company (and trust me, they're bad company).
The design and sets will satisfy your technophilic cravings. The ship has a distinctive design I thought was pretty original and the chic, futuristic (but not cartoonishly futurist) insides made a wonderful backdrop as one man's gilded cage (I like that term, I'm not sure where I first read it...). At times it reminded me of a videogame in how you just wonder round and discover this three dimensional labyrinth where it neatly recycles some ideas that were wasted on Space Oddyssey.
Watching this movie you just have to accept that there was no failsafe to early awakening because "the pods don't malfunction". When you think how much Health and Safety effects our lives right now, it's hard for me to accept that that would stop them hedging their bets. I can suspend disbelief for everything else no problem but this annoys me.
So finally our deuteragonist becomes part of this. When I was reviewing "Mother!" I said that every role that went to Lawrence should have gone to Kristen Stewart (yeah, I know, bring on the dislikes), but this character was actually quite perfect for her, which is a discredit to the character. Rarely in fiction does one encounter someone as smug, self-satisfied and hoity-toity as this mademoiselle. I get the impression that I am just supposed to buy that she's the perfect that is out of any mechanic's league, but it's an informed attribute. Like how apparently they are an unlikely pair though personally I think he would dump her before she dumped him. We was a cool, sexy guy and a lot less self absorbed. When he asks her out she actually says "I thought you'd never ask". You coulda asked him out, you can either be a *girl* or help smash patriarchy, not both.
The story actually has a lot of punch as it shows not only an initially desperate situation but also the extent this compels us to do something embarrassing to the one we really want to like us and the aftermath. So yeah, he's in the doghouse for a bit.
That's another thing that bugged me: I wouldn't have thought about this a few years ago but it seems to always be the male character that the pursuer, the one that pines for the female and is the one that has to live with the idea that they messed up in their pursuit of the female. Why can't it be a male character that gets pursued this way, or a female character that is shown to pine and pursue a male? It could be homosexual or just inverted straightness, but it would be so easy to do...so that's my rant.
Our final act is pretty intense and the suspense is really there. It's a pity that it's wasted hear since I was never sufficiently invested in this romance for it to have much of an emotional impact and the timing is frequently off. Suspense is like a joke, each part can't be too slow or too quick, it's a delicate operation but it looks stunning with a lot of inventive moments convincingly realized.
Ultimately, passengers is a sweet piece of high budget science fiction with a perfectly workable plot that is fine for a Monday night, only really marred by a bland (but likeable enough) character and one really annoying character. The script isn't exactly tight either; a lot of the cutsiness just falls flat. But there's a good chuckle or two in the mix.