THE PASSENGER

Is this 1975 film, directed by Michelangelo Antonioni and starring Jack Nicholson, a masterpiece or an empty piece of pretentious tosh?

More to the point, is it worth two hours of your time?

For me, definitely yes, but then again I can happily watch any Nicholson film from this era, even when his character is as elusive as in this picture.

He plays David Locke, a journalist on an assignment in an African country (Chad, according to Wikipedia) where there is an ongoing conflict between the government and a rebel force. 

At his hotel when he discovers that a fellow guest David Robertson has died of a heart attack, Locke takes on Robertson's identity, and fools the hotel management and therefore the outside world into believing that it is Locke who has died.

The rest of the film, set mainly in Spain, consists of Locke trying to evade various people. 

Firstly there is his boss, Martin, and subsequently his estranged wife, Rachel, who simply want to meet Robertson because he was one of the last people to talk to Locke. 

When Rachel begins to discover the truth she involves the Spanish police in trying to find 'Robertson', persuading them that he is in danger.

And in fact Locke’s life really is at risk because Robertson was selling arms to the rebels, and the Chad government are not best pleased with him. 

In a masterful and mesmerising final scene (a six-minute tracking shot) henchmen of the government catch up with Locke and kill him in his hotel room. Minutes later Rachel and police officers arrive; when asked if she can identify the dead body Rachel simply says she doesn't know him. It’s a suitably bleak ending to Locke's life.

There's a significant early conversation between Locke and Robertson on the subject of travelling. Locke complains that whatever new places and people you meet your responses are always limited by your fixed point of view.  

If taking Robertson's identity is Locke's way of refreshing his outlook on life then it ends in failure, symbolised by a certain symmetry between the start and end of the story. 

In the early scenes Locke tries in vain to meet a guerrilla gang, and when his vehicle gets stuck in the sand he is forced to abandon it, and return to his hotel.

At the end of the film his vehicle gets damaged in his efforts to evade the police, so he is forced to abandon it, before making his way to the hotel where Robertson had an appointment in his diary. 

He is persuaded to do so by a companion and lover he has acquired along the way, memorably played by Maria Schneider, because she thinks he needs some purpose.

That Locke's dead body, face down on his bed, mirrors the way Robertson's body was found by Locke, only serves to emphasise Locke's failure to break free from whatever is troubling him.

If the viewer finds all this existential angst, if that is what it is, frustrating and annoying at least the cinematography is stunning, containing many memorable images, especially those on location shot in Algeria and Spain.

RATING: ✓✓ Good Times