The Passenger (1975 film)

The Passenger
Italian theatrical release poster
ItalianProfessione: reporter
Directed byMichelangelo Antonioni
Written byMark Peploe
Michelangelo Antonioni
Peter Wollen
Produced byCarlo Ponti
StarringJack Nicholson
Maria Schneider
Steven Berkoff
Ian Hendry
Jenny Runacre
CinematographyLuciano Tovoli
Edited byMichelangelo Antonioni
Franco Arcalli
Music byIvan Vandor
Production
companies
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Compagnia Cinematografica Champion
CIPI Cinematografica
Les Films Concordia
Distributed byCinema International Corporation (international)
United Artists (United States)
Release dates
  • 28 February 1975 (1975-02-28) (Italy)
  • 18 June 1975 (1975-06-18) (France)
  • 20 May 1976 (1976-05-20) (Spain)
Running time
126 minutes
CountriesItaly
Spain
France
LanguagesEnglish
German
Spanish
French
Box office$768,744 (2005 re-release)[1]

The Passenger (Italian: Professione: reporter) is a 1975 drama film directed by Michelangelo Antonioni. Written by Antonioni, Mark Peploe, and Peter Wollen, the film is about a disillusioned Anglo-American journalist, David Locke (Jack Nicholson), who assumes the identity of a dead businessman while working on a documentary in Chad, unaware that he is impersonating an arms dealer with connections to the rebels in the civil war. Along the way, he is accompanied by an unnamed young woman (Maria Schneider).

The Passenger was the final film in Antonioni's three-picture deal with producer Carlo Ponti and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, after Blowup (1966) and Zabriskie Point (1970). The film received strong reviews, with critics praising Antonioni's direction, Nicholson's performance, the cinematography, and its themes of identity, disillusionment and existentialism. During the film's release, it was in competition for the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival.[2]

The film was originally released by MGM through United Artists in the United States, but in partial settlement of a dispute over a different project, Nicholson received the film rights and reportedly kept it out of video distribution until Sony Pictures offered to remaster and re-release it.[3] In 2005, with Nicholson's consent, Sony Pictures Classics remastered the film, giving it a limited theatrical re-release on 28 October 2005, and releasing it on DVD on 25 April 2006.[4][5]

  1. ^ "The Passenger (1975)". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved 1 May 2023.
  2. ^ "Festival de Cannes: The Passenger". Cannes Film Festival. Retrieved 2 May 2009.
  3. ^ Goldstein, Patrick (25 October 2005). "Some vintage Jack". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 16 November 2022.
  4. ^ "The Passenger—Now on DVD". Sony Pictures. Retrieved 1 May 2023.
  5. ^ Dargis, Manohla (28 October 2005). "'The Passenger' Review: Antonioni's Characters Escape Into Ambiguity and Live (Your View Here) Ever After". The New York Times. Retrieved 27 April 2024.