The Tourist

May 18, 2011

Director: Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck,
Starring: Johnny Depp, Angelina Jolie, Paul Bettany, Timothy Dalton, Steven Berkoff, Rufus Sewell, Christian De Sica,

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DVD Review

Darren Jamieson +

Not since Bruce Willis turning out to be a ghost in The Sixth Sense have I seen a film with quite as obvious a plot twist as The Tourist. In the Sixth Sense we had a film marketed on a plot twist about a boy who can see and talk to ghosts, then, in the opening scene Bruce Willis is shot and we never see him recover. Hmmm… I wonder what the twist could be.

The Tourist has something equally taxing to get your little grey cells around. In The Tourist, Elise (Angelina Jolie looking as radiant and porcelain doll like as ever) is trying to reconnect with her lover, a suave accountant who is on the run after ripping off a cockney gangster for millions. In order to stay hidden from both the vengeance driven gangster and the police, headed up by serial villain in American films Paul Bettany, the never seen accountant has had plastic surgery.

Elise then receives a note to go to a certain train station at a certain time, board the train to Venice and pick a stranger who matches her lover’s height and build in order to throw off the police. She picks Johnny Depp, playing a vacationing maths teacher from America.

Can you spot the twist? If you can’t I won’t spoil it, but you really shouldn’t be watching thrillers.

Anyhow, Angelina gives her usual sultry yet powerful woman performance (the sort that probably convinced Brad Pitt he’d married the wrong woman and should leave her immediately) and Johnny Depp is on top form as the lovesick maths teacher taken in by her spell. He actually saves the film, as the image of a panicked Depp clambering over the rooftops of Venice dressed in his pyjamas more than makes up for the lack of action.

Despite this film being touted as an action movie, there’s only one foot chase and one speed boat chase, which is pretty slow as it’s in Venice and one of the boats is going backwards.

Anyhow, it’s a welcome sight to see former James Bond Timothy Dalton back in Hollywood movies, even if he is, once again, playing a member of the British Secret Service (well, sort of).

Pirates fans will love the final scene of the film where Johnny drops his American accent for a few moments and puts on a British one, making him sound just like Captain Jack Sparrow. This was the laugh out loud moment from the movie.

The Tourist is a bit of a non-entity of a film really. It plods along at a meandering pace, with little in the way of action and an impending plot twist that you would have to be blind not to see coming yet, for some reason (Johnny Depp probably) the film is somewhat watchable.

Darren Jamieson

Darren has enjoyed an interest in film for many years, studying the subject at Newport Film School where he worked on the film ‘Cop on the Edge IX: Prelude to Justice‘ in a directing and acting capacity. The official site can be enjoyed here. Darren setup WhatDVD.Net in 2003 to further his love of films and to write passionately about the movies he enjoys, and about those that he doesn’t.

Although his day-to-day activities mean that he now has less time to review movies than he would ideally prefer, he still tries to review new releases, and DVDs from his extensive collection, whenever possible.
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