THE PASSENGER (1975)

In Michelangelo Antonioni’s The Passenger / Professione: reporter, the protagonist David Locke (Jack Nicholson) initially appears to have an admirable, even enviable, life. Scrounging for interview footage in northern Chad for a BBC documentary, his efforts may be tireless and thankless throughout the film’s opening quarter-hour, with his search for subjects in this scorching heat providing no breakthroughs, but he’s still got the advantages of a respectable and adventurous career. His wife, Rachel (Jenny Runacre), over in England, might not be the most faithful of spouses, but there’s still some feeling left there. And yet, a sense of weightlessness appears to have gathered within David, gradually blossoming with little appreciation from its host of its growth process, until it coalesces into a daring idea when a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity emerges.

After seeing that Robertson (Charles Mulvehill), a fellow guest in David’s hotel who had struck up a casual acquaintance with this protagonist, has suddenly passed away, David decides to use the two men’s likeness to his advantage, assuming Robertson’s identity and effectively declaring himself dead. His newfound avatar will find him taking on the identity of an arms dealer since Robertson provided weapons to the very same rebels in Chad that David was attempting to make contact with. But journalism is the last thing on this protagonist’s mind; even as he abandons his old life entirely and becomes an aimless globetrotter, he retains the same reticence that prompted him to take on the façade of another man.

Even after having only seen one other Antonioni film before this, Red Desert (1964), a common theme already emerges in the acclaimed Italian director’s filmography. Loneliness haunts these protagonists wherever they go, with life—and these films—offering no answers for how to stave off this feeling. In Red Desert, this was suffused through the stark and brutal imagery of industrialisation, long monologues pontificating the meaning of existence, and quite a few unintentionally funny moments where Monica Vitti dramatically and abruptly turns to face her interlocutor, often while leaning against a wall. Where that film failed was in its meandering conversations, inherent silliness despite its helpless moping, and an overreliance on harrowing imagery and sound design.

In the case of The Passenger, the weariness that plagues David is even more abstract on its surface, with scant dialogue and a rotation of gorgeous backdrops from different locales. One would think, then, that Antonioni isn’t just bound to repeat the same mistakes here, but that they would be even more pronounced in an airy, dry film that’s so committed to the feeling of weightlessness that it winds up drifting away from deeper meanings or emotional resonance. But while this director again shows no interest in solutions for his characters’ malaise, this is a far more touching, melancholic piece, largely because it doesn’t insist on its downtrodden qualities. After all, there’s little rational sense in David discarding his life and identity for aimless wandering. He knows this, too; he even says as much, though it will take a long time to draw even that much conversation out of him.

Like Vitti’s Giuliana in Red Desert, David is well aware that there’s something profoundly wrong with him and that he can’t put it into words. But Antonioni takes this approach a step further in The Passenger, with this protagonist hardly ever bothering to articulate that he doesn’t know what makes him tick, or what kind of emotion could be so powerful as to convince a man to abandon everything he’s ever known. There are no stark buildings and haunting sounds to bleed dry the joy in life, just as lengthy monologues are thankfully absent (dialogue doesn’t appear to be Antonioni’s strong suit). There are no such easy rationalisations this time around, as the world around David is frequently beautiful, and in the traditional, vibrant sense, too. There’s simply no escaping the illogical rhythm of his haunted soul; it won’t map onto anything around him. And yet, this director still somehow manages to make these compositions feel achingly melancholic. It’s not a consistent trick—it might take minutes at a time for an image to rise above the realm of the aesthetically pleasing to feel genuine—but the effect is powerful when it occurs.

Antonioni might be doggedly committed to keeping his cards close to his chest when it comes to this protagonist, but there are still illuminating moments here that sting with their naked honesty. David’s travels find him coming across an unnamed young woman (Maria Schneider, credited simply as ‘Girl’), who decides to accompany him. As they drive in a convertible, she asks him why he’s doing this. He tells her to stand up and turn around. In the backseat, she faces the view that’s gradually shrinking into the horizon, her back to the present, whose images she can only view once they’ve already passed her by. A look of exuberance on her face soon shifts to something sadder. In Red Desert, this moment of poignancy would have been indicated by a dramatic turn from Vitti, then a forceful monologue on what it means to hurt. Here, the poignancy isn’t even centred on this young woman’s silent, changing expressions, but on the shot that proceeds this, depicting her point of view as the convertible races forward, turning everything it gets close to into a memory.

These moments of fleeting beauty are strong enough to counteract the flights of drabness that infect this narrative, which flags more often than it soars. Aside from scenes of raw beauty like the aforementioned exchange between Schneider and Nicholson’s characters, it’s difficult to pinpoint why some sequences feel profound in their simplicity while others are hardly worth remarking upon. In its totality, The Passenger’s generally carefree attitude ensures that it could lose roughly 30 minutes worth of this drama, or gain an additional 60, and little of value would be gained or lost. At times it treats its protagonist as carelessly as he considers his own existence, repelling the pull of genre intrigue in the wake of Robertson’s criminal associations. If there is any lasting anxiety within David’s, it is related to the maelstrom of emotions that he can scarcely bury, instead of being influenced even slightly by the fact that he’s made himself a wanted man and attracted the interest of several unwelcome trackers.

Rachel is hardly a character in this narrative, and while this claim could be made about almost anyone here (since even Schneider and Nicholson’s characters exist more as states of being than fleshed out characters), there’s little for her to provide in the story. There can be no interiority here, since this world has become the canvas through which David’s emotions are felt, leaving little to care about when it comes to his wife. We know she’s grieving, but it’s impossible to feel anything on that front. We also assume she and David have a rich history that could lend a much-needed lived-in feeling to this character and their dynamic (and which would create a complex and unknowable tapestry that juxtaposes their marriage with David’s apathy when it comes to ever seeing Rachel again), but there are no storytelling avenues offered to the viewer to reckon with these details.

Schneider embodies the wide-eyed optimism of a young woman on the cusp of self-discovery, but she also embarks on an intriguing journey in her performance as this character realises she has more affinity with David’s loneliness than she’d thought possible. As for Nicholson, he’s masterful at conveying the silent anger, fear, and despair of a man who rarely speaks his mind. There isn’t a single moment where it isn’t clear as day what this protagonist is feeling, with Nicholson never opting for anything too showy or remote, a restrained and delicate tightrope of a performance that’s masterfully realised. The Passenger also boasts some impressive extended sequences, particularly its six-minute-long penultimate shot, which again doesn’t suffer from vanity, disregarding showiness as it cleverly emphasises this scene’s drama by concealing it from view.

Despite these technical and emotional highs, I possess a similar kind of reticence to David when it comes to rewatching a film like this, which is far easier to appreciate in retrospect than it is to be entertained by. There’s a beguiling quality to this narrative that always keeps you vaguely interested, but minutes often go by without a single absorbing moment in this gently melancholic, occasionally stirring tone poem.

ITALY • SPAIN • FRANCE | 1975 | 126 MINUTES | 1.85:1 | COLOUR | ENGLISH • GERMAN • SPANISH • FRENCH

Cast and Crew:

director: Michelangelo Antonioni.
writers: Michelangelo Antonioni, Mark Peploe & Peter Wollen.
starring: Jack Nicholson, Maria Schneider, Jenny Runacre, Ian Hendry, Charles Mulvehill, Ambroise Bia, Steven Berkoff & José María Caffarel.