A lot of feminists hate Morten Tyldum's "Passengers," and for good reasons. Though it's set in a bright, high-tech future where luxury space travel is the norm, where women are concerned the story's underlying sentiments hail straight from the Middle Ages. On the other hand, just as many other filmgoers may love "Passengers." If you can get past the gender politics, it's easy to get caught up in this desperately romantic tale of two very attractive people.
My guess is that the Japanese will go for "Passengers" in a big way because at the core of the story is a goofy engineer who gets the beautiful girl, something that the Japanese (especially Japanese engineers) are conditioned to think never happens — not even in the movies. Engineers just don't get gorgeous girls. They work too hard and too long, they never make a lot of money and they're considered not particularly articulate about, or even interested in, things that aren't in their field of expertise.
Chris Pratt's character Jim Preston fits this bill perfectly, but he's also sneaky and manipulative. Jim employs extremely reprehensible means to get the girl, Aurora (Jennifer Lawrence), who is asleep and helpless in a state of stasis when he first sees her. Aurora, by the way, is the name of the princess in Disney's "Sleeping Beauty." From a feminist perspective, Jim's actions and this name choice ("Sleeping Beauty" is not exactly a politically correct tale) is just asking for a major backlash.