Movies
Passengers
“Passengers is a film that tries to do too many things at once and, ultimately, fails at making any of them compelling or original. Ronnie Christensen’s script manages to go from high school psychology lesson to Lifetime “Movie Of The Week” to Shyamalan territory in around ninety minutes and is, sadly, determined to stick with the melodrama more than the supernatural.”
Passengers is a film that tries to do too many things at once and, ultimately, fails at making any of them compelling or original. Ronnie Christensen’s script manages to go from high school psychology lesson to Lifetime “Movie Of The Week” to Shyamalan territory in around ninety minutes and is, sadly, determined to stick with the melodrama more than the supernatural.
Assigned to help the survivors of a recent plane crash come to terms with their emotional states, psychologist Claire Summers (Anne Hathaway) tries to make sense of each remaining passenger’s wildly different account of what caused the accident and happened during the plane’s catastrophic descent. Originally thinking it was trauma that made each recollection of the crash inconsistent from the next, Claire and her patients begin to see mysterious men following them around and start to suspect that the airline is trying to cover up what really happened on the fateful flight. This first act of the film sets up a familiar premise but one that carries the atmosphere of an X-Files episode, even going as far as to have William B. Davis wandering around in a few scenes. At least that’s something interesting. Unfortunately, Christensen had other ideas in mind.
After agreeing to make house calls for Eric (Patrick Wilson), Claire tries to help him piece his life together while trying to rekindle her relationship with a sister that she hasn’t spoken to in years. In an effort to get both of their lives on the right track, Claire and Eric end up elevating their doctor-patient relationship into something more ; namely, one of the most unheated on-screen romances of all time. One creepy visit from a shady airline official (David Morse) later – someone who apparently hung around waiting for Claire to come outside all night so he could get a sleazy recap of what happened the night before – and the two begin to develop conspiracy theories with the remaining passengers who haven’t vanished into thin air since their first group therapy session.
From then on, the unremarkable nature of the script takes hold and delivers contrived plot point after contrived plot point until it reaches the final few reels, where the usage of the most predictable and overused plot twist of all time feels more like a means to the end credits than a revelatory moment for the characters. Director Rodrigo Garcia, who has been praised for his dramatic ensemble projects, manages to distill every ounce of tension and suspense out of the film, leaving us with a bland romantic thriller minus the thrills – unless you count the shriek Hathaway lets out when the wind blows a newspaper into her face as being an effective jump scare.
Sony’s 1080p transfer for Passengers is too good for a film so bland and produces some spectacular visuals during the plane crash and nighttime sequences. The image is crisp and clear for the most part, save for a few moments here and there that are soft during the uneventful middle portion of the film. The Dolby TrueHD 5.1 track gets high marks for the crash sequence but tends to produce muffled and unclear dialogue that can’t be heard over background noises. Oh, and whoever made the menus should be fired, as they give away the “surprise” ending and remove what little drive you might have to watch the film in the first place.
Special Features
Commentary – If there was one extra on the disc I would recommend skipping, it would be this one. Featuring director Rodrigo Garcia and star Patrick Wilson, this track has a lot of rambling on it and just goes over the same information presented in the two documentaries on the disc and is about as in-depth, too. They do say some fairly interesting things here and there but not often enough to justify sitting through the snooze-fest that is this commentary.
Analysis Of The Plane Crash (16:28) – Considering that the plane footage only takes up a little over five minutes of the film’s runtime, this is a fairly extensive look at the CGI work done on Passengers. Things start off with Doug Oddy and Eric Nordby, the visual effects supervisors, talking about integrating CGI into certain scenes and what sort of techniques they used in doing so, as well as how the finished scenes compare to the storyboards. David Brisbin, the production designer, gabs a bit about location scouting for the crash site and Garcia and cinematographer Igor Jadue-Lillo discuss shooting against green screen and how they made the plane interior convincingly appear to be flying through the sky while wind furiously blew through it – pre-CGI. Truth be told, this special feature is actually more interesting than the film itself.
The Manifest And Making Of Passengers (23:14) – A typical making-of, with floating head interviews from a significant amount of the actors involved, as well as behind-the-camera talent. There isn’t as much technique discussed as I’d like; however, the actors do try to deconstruct their characters in their interview snippets and Garcia and Jadue-Lillo talk about their visual approach more extensively than in Analysis Of The Plane Crash. The screenwriter and producers are also given a chance to say their piece about the film and talent involved.
Deleted Scenes (7:17) – A collection of three deleted scenes, including a break-up scene between Eric and Claire (you do not break-up with Anne Hathaway, Anne Hathaway breaks up with you!), an extra conversation between Claire and Norman (Don Thompson) and a dream sequence.
Hollywood tends to learn all of the wrong lessons when confronted with an indie success story that doesn’t follow the established rules of the industry. For instance, instead of accepting that the massive success of Backrooms has more to do with Kane Parsons’ individual talent as an established artist who has been producing high-quality videos since the pandemic (combined with the popularity of liminal horror among younger audiences), producers are now trudging through old Reddit posts looking for the next viral meme that studios think might have the potential to be turned into a cash cow.
This is by no means a new phenomenon, and I think one of the most pertinent examples of Hollywood misunderstanding what makes a movie work has to be the aftermath of The Blair Witch Project. While Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sanchez’s genre-defining movie proved that POV camerawork and lo-fi aesthetics can captivate mainstream audiences when backed by a genuinely compelling story, there was a sudden trend of filmmakers attempting to appear hip by incorporating found footage into their films as if the occasional presence of diegetic recordings was enough to make a movie seem “hip”.
That’s why the 2000s were such a frustrating period for found footage fans, as the genre was still mostly relegated to obscure indie productions while studios only teased us with the format’s narrative potential. And yet, talented filmmakers can tell compelling stories under any circumstances, and this is how we get to the weird world of found footage bonus features produced alongside traditional movies.
Diegetic filmmaking may not necessarily be easier than conventional camerawork (it’s a lot harder to simulate reality without the added toolbox of cinematic editing), but it’s certainly a hell of a lot cheaper. That’s why it makes sense that plenty of high profile projects invested in found footage bonus content in order to add value to their home video releases – a once profitable industry that is sorely missed in the current media landscape.
The irony here is that many of these found footage extras were a little too good when compared to their promotional origins. With that in mind, I’d like to take a closer look at three examples of found footage bonus features that were better than the movie they were meant to enhance!
3. Halloween: Resurrection (2002): WebCam Special
I might lose some of my horror cred for admitting this, but Halloween: Resurrection was actually the first Halloween film I ever saw. Thankfully, this misguided entry didn’t scare me off from watching the other movies in the series, but even as a teenager I recognized that the flick’s premise of an online streaming show gone wrong had some merit to it – it’s just too bad that these ideas were never fully realized in the feature itself.
It was only years later that I discovered the fabled WebCam Special on Resurrection’s physical media release and got the film I had always wanted. This 41-minute cut of the film is by no means a masterpiece, but excluding everything except for the found footage elements of the production somehow transforms this ill-advised sequel into a deeply unsettling exercise in voyeuristic cinema.
In fact, I’d argue that the long takes of Michael simply moving through the house without calling attention to himself are much closer to John Carpenter’s original vision of the bogeyman than any of the exaggerated sequels that depict The Shape as something more akin to a superpowered Jason Voorhees. It’s just a shame that the franchise would never explore this format again.
2. Believers (2007): The Quanta Group Videos
Daniel Myrick’s Believers is by no means a bad movie, with this direct-to-video thriller following a duo of paramedics who find themselves captured by a deranged death cult inspired by all the worst aspects of Jonestown and Heaven’s Gate. Unfortunately, the Blair Witch alumni’s low-budget exploration of religious madness was quickly forgotten simply because most people didn’t bother to engage with the other half of the experience by exploring the DVD menu.
Within the disc’s extras, Myrick actually included in-universe interviews and orientation videos meant to expand the Quanta Group’s backstory and beliefs. These found footage recordings greatly enhance The Believers by providing much-needed context for some of the film’s scariest moments. There’s even a wonderfully creepy epilogue sequence here as another group explores the cult’s dilapidated compound after the events of the film.
While it’s baffling that this material didn’t make it into the movie itself through in-universe cutaways (especially IO’s darkly humorous interview), watching it alongside Myrick’s film turns the whole thing into a highly compelling multi-media experience.
1. Dawn of the Dead (2004): The Lost Tape & Special Report: Zombie Invasion
I’ve always considered 2004’s Dawn of the Dead remake to be Zack Snyder’s best film (though most of the flick’s qualities are the result of James Gunn’s excellent script) even if it fails to capture the social anxieties of Romero’s 1978 original. However, this apocalyptic production is also the perfect example of an expensive project being overshadowed by the low-budget bonus features on its own home video release.
You see, the Dawn of the Dead DVD actually boasts two separate found footage short films that I find much scarier than the movie they’re marketing. The Lost Tape: Andy’s Terrifying Last Days Revealed is a somber video diary written by Gunn and starring Bruce Bohne as the ill-fated Andy – a minor character in the main film who becomes trapped in his own gun store when the zombies attack. Then there’s my personal favorite, Special Report: Zombie Invasion, a fully simulated news program starring Babylon 5’s Richard Biggs (as well as Bruce Boxleitner) that chronicles the spread of the undead virus.
Not only do these bonus features add context to Snyder’s film, but I’d argue that they make for a better standalone viewing experience than the so-called “main attraction”. Special Report honestly feels like a charming low-budget adaptation of Max Brooks’ World War Z novel (despite coming out a couple of years before that book was published), and I adore how The Lost Tapes turns Andy into a genuinely tragic figure.
These obviously aren’t the only found footage extras worth revisiting (for instance, I adore that Skull Island mockumentary that accompanied the special edition of Peter Jackson’s King Kong remake), but I figured that the three aforementioned projects could provide us with a snapshot of a curious moment in popular culture where found footage could still impress viewers despite not being quite as respected by the studio system.
That being said, don’t forget to sound off in the comments below if you can think of any other found footage bonus features that deserve a shout-out! After all, I’d love to see this trend of diegetic extras make a comeback in modern times – especially where found footage-heavy movies like Backrooms are concerned.
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