Rachel McAdams is negotiating to star in sci-fi movie Passengers now that a scheduling conflict has caused Reese Witherspoon to bow out. McAdams would be playing a woman in cryogenic sleep on a long interstellar voyage to a new planet. When a computer glitch causes a male passenger to wake up 90 years early, he unfreezes a woman to keep him company. They’re calling that a love story for some reason, not a horror movie.
Already signed to star as the creepy unfreezer is Keanu Reeves, who seemed like a solid dude in his Reddit AMA. Oh, so that’s why it’s not billed as a horror movie, because Keanu Reeves is hot. Sure, he can unfreeze people, but when I try to find Walt Disney’s frozen head, I’m a “trespasser” and a “person who should put on some pants”. YOU WOULDN’T SAY THAT TO KEANU, MAGIC KINGDOM.
Considering this is a film with only two actors in space, we can safely say we’d rather see the chemistry between Rachel McAdams and Keanu Reeves than Witherspoon and Reeves. Also not surprising is that The Weinstein Company is making Passengers a priority now that Gravity — another movie about a man and woman alone in space — has grossed over $330M.
Director Brian Kirk (Game Of Thrones, Boardwalk Empire) is also replacing Gabriele Muccino (Pursuit of Happyness, Seven Pounds) for reasons we don’t know. Perhaps because it’s not a depressing movie staring Will Smith. Or perhaps because he said he wanted a “lesser-known” actor as the female star, and there’s no way a studio’s going to take that risk in a big budget movie with only two leads.
(Banner picture via vipflash / Shutterstock.com.)