THE TOURIST

Florian Henckel Von Donnersmarck’s second feature film is a far cry from his critically acclaimed debut, The Lives of Others, which won him the Best Foreign Language Film at the 2007 Academy Awards. The Tourist is the story of Frank Tupelo (Johnny Depp) – maths teacher, tourist, and ‘ultimate ordinary man’ – and his encounter with the beautiful, mysterious and complex woman Elise (Angelina Jolie) as he takes a train to Venice. The beauty of this film is that it never tries to be more than it is: a well-made, engaging, and taut thriller, played with no small degree of wry humour. The leads are both great, sharing an obvious chemistry (not to mention being extremely easy on the eye) and the succinct 103 minutes flies by in a heartbeat. Perhaps not another Oscar contender, but certainly a damn good romp. (KB) ***1/2