There are European directors who toil away for years before attaining any Hollywood recognition and many of them go on to successful State-side careers. Very rarely a director strikes it big with his debut. Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film for his first feature film, the brilliant The Lives of Others. Now you can see his follow-up, The Tourist, a star vehicle for Johnny Depp and Angelina Jolie. It is decidedly mainstream, albeit with what many would call a European sensibility.
With Christopher McQuarrie, who penned The Usual Suspects, as one of the credited screenwriters (along with von Donnersmarck and Gosford Park scribe Julian Fellowes) it may come as no surprise that the plot harbors a few secrets and maybe a twist, which you’ll see coming a mile away if you’re even remotely well-versed in the tropes of the spy genre, as Frank Tupelo (Depp’s character) is.
