The Tourist (2010– 103 mins) Johnny Depp, Angelina Jolie

Interpol is after 2 thieves, Elise (Jolie) and her mysterious counterpart the master thief in disguise Alexander Pierce. However, even tho Elise is an accomplished thief herself the real big fish is Pierce. Not only has he stolen nearly a million dollars that the police want, but the mob is after him for much more then that. In order to elude Interpol Elise uses an American tourist on vacation, Frank (Depp). So not only is Elise trying to find the master thief and his money and keep herself free, she is trying to keep charismatic and likable Frank safe from harm as well. This ends up with some action chases and espionage. It sets up well and should be more exciting, but the chases are short, the espionage has no intrigue longer then 10 mins and the plot twists can be seen coming a mile away. This hurts the movie b/c all we are left with are some chuckles at the action that I don’t think are entirely intended.

The director of “The Tourist” set out to make an actiony/ thief caper with two actors who of late have been in two different genres of film. Normally it doesn’t really matter to the viewer where they come from but when you see Jolie running around in the film it seems normal, almost like you are looking at “Salt” again. However, you get a weird feeling watching Depp run around in chase scenes, b/c  we just gravitate to feeling as if we are watching Jack Sparrow running on rooftops. He even runs in the same manner. There is just a certain feeling when we are watching him speak, it’s just hard to take him too serious as it. It takes a slight bit away from the film, not that he’s a bad actor, I think the script and holey plot take away from his acting, and he is unable to convince us of what he is here.

Verdict–> An “OK” movie at best. Depp is charismatic and likable as always and Jolie has her usual sparkle in her smile, but the movie falls flat. I kept waiting for the obvious twist to not be true and for something more in depth to happen. It never does. Also the obvious twist is so unbelievable and implausible that it’s frankly—> Laughable. Sorry the tourist is one trip I recommend you not take… Yeah that was a bad attempt at a pun. (Wait for it to come on cable, not really worth a rental)

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