Movies - Professione: reporter

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	Movies - Professione: reporter

Professione: reporter (in English-language markets The Passenger, and occasionally Profession: Reporter) is a film directed and co-written by Michelangelo Antonioni, released in 1975, in which Jack Nicholson stars as a reporter in Africa who assumes the identity of a stranger who has dropped dead. The film was nominated for "Palme d'Or" award at 1975 Cannes Film Festival.

Plot summary

David Locke, a television journalist played by Jack Nicholson, is in a desert searching for rebels. He keeps failing: his contacts abandon him, his Land Rover gives out. Tired of his work, his marriage and his life, he decides to switch identity with that of Mr Robertson (Charles Mulvehill), an Englishman who has fortuitously checked in at the same hotel that he is staying at, when, the day after they share a chat and a few drinks with each other, Locke enters the adjoining room where he is staying, only to discover Robertson has died in his sleep, apparently from alcoholic intoxication. To assume Mr Robertson's identity, David must carefully cut the photographs out of their passports, swap them, and reseal them. Since the motel manager is black and has already mistaken him for Robertson, and since both Locke and Mr Robertson are white, the plan should go off without any hitches.

The ruse works, and Locke's wife Rachel (Jenny Runacre) is eventually informed of his death. Unable to believe it or accept it, she attempts to contact the sole witness, Mr Robertson (i.e. Locke masquerading as the Englishman) to find out about his death. "Robertson" (Locke) has now returned to Europe with the real (i.e. dead) Mr.Robertson's agenda.

As Locke works to keep Robertson's appointments across Europe, he learns that Robertson was a major gunrunner for the rebels. Robertson is, of course, unpopular with the governments opposing his rebels, and one of them is sponsoring a team that has orders to assassinate him. Later, with David Locke checked into another hotel, he finds himself followed by British Embassy people trying to track him down on behalf of his wife. It also appears that his business associates don't like being stiffed on the sale of merchandise that never arrived. He feels he is being watched, so he asks an architecture student (Maria Schneider) to retrieve his belongings. She (never named) and Locke later become lovers.

Attempting to flee the authorities, David Locke has some high speed chases, and cross-country chases, and even run-ins with the local police. His girlfriend (played by Maria Schneider) is invaluable here because his command of Spanish and French is extraordinarily clumsy, and she, to their benefit, speaks like a native.

Taking a ferry to Algiers, he thinks he has finally outrun the thugs that are trying to kill him, but they eventually catch up with him in a hotel in a small Spanish town: the assassination is not shown on screen, but implied via a virtuoso long take wide-screen pan from across the street.

Evaluation

Professione: reporter has been considered remarkable for its camerawork (by Luciano Tovoli) and acting. While the movie has been critically praised by such movie critics as Peter Travers of Rolling Stone and Manohla Dargis of The New York Times, it has also been criticized by Roger Ebert, Danny Peary and others for being slow-moving and pretentious. Ebert has since changed his stance on the film, and now considers it a perceptive look at identity, alienation, and mankind's desire to escape oneself.

Viewing, Viewing, and Reviewing

The movie rewards those who see the movie more than once. Although the last scene in the movie ends by fading out with a long distance panning shot of the motel he has just checked into, night falling over the small North African town, this appears to bring closure to the movie. An inquiry into his death does not exactly end with his wife identifying his body, for there is a tantalizing possibility that the young woman played by Maria Schneider was much more than an innocent bystander just tagging along for the ride.

Although Jack Nicholson played the man driving the car, avoiding both hitmen and government policemen alike, she may have resented being forced to take a subservient role as his helpmate. For one thing, her command of Spanish and French was superior to his, and it doesn't appear he actually appreciated the help she was providing him with. Then, later, she had to have become highly embittered with him for some minor slight or other, that she decided to contact the very hit men they were previously bent on avoiding. This probably happened just after they crossed the Mediterranean back to Africa, having just short-sheeted a gun-running cartel in Switzerland or Italy. She might have fingered him because she was angry with him for destroying her car. This is one of the reasons the movie was named "The Passenger" in the United States - because, although he may be the driver, or the one behind the wheel, his life was really in her hands from the moment he met her, and on. The issue of a woman's presence in a movie is often lost with male reviewers who detail all that they see in the movie, and forget that there are also things happening behind the scenes, and which are never accurately documented by the camera. Since the most pivotal role in the movie is the one that Maria Schneider has, it is known as The Passenger in the U.S.

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