Rachel McAdams Joins Passengers, Yet Another Sci-Fi Romance
This article is more than 2 years old
Rachel McAdams may be perky and adorable and all that, but she’s got some genre nerd in her as well. Not only did she make the time jumping romance The Time Traveler’s Wife, next week sees the release of yet another time traveling love story starring the 35-year-old Canadian, Richard Curtis’ romantic comedy About Time. And if that isn’t enough, she’s on the verge of joining yet another science fiction-themed love story, Passengers, for the folks at the Weinstein Company.
According to Deadline, if McAdams signs on to Passengers, which she is reportedly in talks to do, her part will pit her opposite Keanu Reeves. As you might recall, he also has ample experience when it comes to traveling through time, via both his excellent adventure and bogus journey with his good friend Bill. From the description, though, it doesn’t sound like they’ll be doing much time traveling, by phone booth or otherwise, in this film.
McAdams would also reportedly be taking over for Reese Witherspoon. TWC bought the rights to Passengers, and committed $25 million to the budget, during a three way bidding war that erupted at the Cannes Film Festival last may with Witherspoon attached as the female lead. We’ll see if that changes now that the Legally Blonde star has been forced to drop out due to scheduling conflicts with the Germany-based production.
The set up of Passengers may remind some of you of Gravity, as the story primarily revolves around two people alone in space. That, however, is where the similarities end. Due to a malfunction on a spaceship transporting a large group of colonists to their new home world, a single sleep chamber opens up and lets one guy (Reeves) out 90 years before anyone else is scheduled to join him. I can’t stop picturing the scene in The Matrix where he unplugs himself. Because he’s lonely and doesn’t want to get old and die by himself, he wakes up a female passenger (McAdams) to keep him company. Surely I’m not the only one that sees this as a totally dick move. Let’s hope they like each other, because otherwise things are going to suck for both of them.
Brian Kirk, most known for helming big cable shows like Game of Thrones, Boardwalk Empire, and Dexter, will direct Passengers. Prometheus writer John Spaihts wrote the script, and while you have to imagine that there will be less alien abortion in this film, you also hope that the characters will make better decisions overall.
There’s no hard date set for Passengers, but the distributor is hoping for a wide release sometime in the later portion of next year. That’s 2014 if you’re keeping track.
