The Tourist

It came as a total shocker to me when I realized that The Tourist is directed by Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck. Guess what? Donnersmarck has also directed a German movie called Das Leben der Anderen (The Lives of Others) which deservedly won the Oscar for the best movie in the category of Foreign Films. An extremely powerful movie which had barely any flaws. So to expect something as drab and lifeless as The Tourist from his table was even more disappointing than the pain of waiting for the movie to end. God, I have, very infrequently so wanted a movie to end.


Elise Clifton Ward (Angelina Jolie) is being watched by the Interpol, led by Inspector John Acheson (Paul Bettany) of Scotland Yard. They are in search of Alexander Pierce who owes the British Government a princely sum of 744 million pounds. A great figure to throw at someone in an story of grand larceny I guess. Elise is spending her time in a plush five star in Paris and makes her way to what I can only imagine is her evening cuppa – I would be very surprised if she were to be dressed up so well around 7 in the morning. She is well aware that she is being watched coz she is Pierce’s girl. She was seeing him during the time Pierce was swindling Underworld Don Reginald Shaw (Steven Berkoff) of 2.5 billion pounds – another fantastic figure to throw at the audience. But Alex decides to take off and leave Elise stranded without any money for nearly 2 years now. And the Interpol has been desperately searching for him for a much longer period of time. Funnily, no one has seen Pierce. With the exception of Shaw.

As Elise is having her usual snack, she gets a courier delivered to her. No surprise that it is engraved with the letters AP. AP apologises, through the letter, and asks her to take the 8:22 to Venice and instructs her to find someone who is about the same height as his own and strike up a conversation so that the cops are thrown off the trail. For someone who is a gilted lover, Elise surely takes off quickly without a thought – after burning the letter though. She does exactly what is instructed of her and finds herself with Frank Tupelo (Johnny Depp) on the train to Venice. Frank is a math teacher from Wisconsin and therefore – The Tourist.

What follows is one of the slowest crime capers that I have ever seen. Lives of Others was slow alright Florian but it was also extremely intense and gripping. Just because a movie is slow doesn’t make it good. Surprisingly large number of inconsistencies like the 8:22 to Venice – was it a morning train or an evening one. If morning then why was Jolie decked up @ 7 am? If evening then how in the blazes does she get to Venice when its all bright and sunny? Does it take 15 minutes to get to Venice from Paris? Not sure but worth a dekko. Performances from Johnny Depp and Jolie would easily rate amongst their worst to date. Paul Bettany was probably the only actor who tried to make an impact. Classic case of “never judge a book by its cover and therefore a movie by its trailer or its poster for that matter”. 4 on 10 from my side and I think I am being generous.