Passengers (2008)

Passengers is about a psychiatrist (Anne Hathaway) treating five survivors of a plane crash. As she grows closer to one of them, played by Patrick Wilson (who totally doesn't sing in this movie argh), her patients start going missing one-by-one. Suspicious airline official David Morse (as usual) mentions that there were no survivors in that crash, and when Anne gets a hold of that passenger list, she sees her name on it.

In other words, Passengers is like the Night Visions episode The Passenger List, starring Aidan Quinn and Paul Guilfoyle.

Except Hallmark-y.

Which is why the Night Visions episode is much more superior to this movie, and no, not because Aidan Quinn was in that. *swoon*

Passengers starts off as a thriller. People go missing, David Morse acts suspicious, some of the people she knows acts suspicious, Patrick Wilson keeps seeking her out like all suspicious-like. And the ending was anti-climactic.

It turns out that the five (well, six) are actually in limbo (technically), and the people around Anne Hathaway were actually supposed to help her come to terms that she's dead, and to move on. Except for Patrick Wilson, of course, because he was on the plane as well.


I would've preferred a conspiracy involving the airline.

In The Passenger List, Aidan Quinn is a crash inspector who receives a call about an airplane crash. Heading on-scene, the coroner tells him that there were no survivors and they've got all the bodies, except for one person who's literally in pieces, and since they're in the process of putting him back together and the passenger list isn't back yet, there is no ID on the guy. He becomes romantically involved with this lady whose family died on the plane, and as he investigates, suspicious things (I can't remember what; it's been a long time since I saw this) start to happen. Eventually, he gets a call from the coroner who tells him that they've finally pieced the body together. By the time he gets there, the passenger list has been faxed/despatched over as well, and viewing the body, he sees... him.

As in, himself. It's his body.

Flash-forward (or something like that), and he wakes up on a plane. THE plane. As he panics, he sees familiar faces, ones he's (and we've) seen throughout the episode, and the lady he's currently dating. The plane malfunctions, and the episode ends with the first few people to arrive onto the scene, telephoning Aidan Quinn, and his cellphone starts to ring a few feet away from them.

See? THAT'S how you make a thriller. Although The Passenger List is only a half hour, but seriously, it's Hollywood. They can hire people to make it an hour and a half longer. I will blog about my love for Night Visions another time; I want to finish this and watch TV now).

Anyway, the only thing I like about the movie was the ending, and not because it meant the movie was over, but because it was... sweet. Anne Hathaway and Patrick Wilson turned out to be acquaintances on the plane, and as it was crashing and Anne's panicking and screaming, "We're all gonna DIE!!", Patrick consoles her and tells her that he is there for/with her, and flashbacking through the movie, HE was the one who kept meeting up with her, and kept her company, and seeking her out, and generally, was WITH HER.

I thought it was sweet, and basically the only thing in the movie that made it even worth the two hours. Sappy, but sweet.