Last night’s premiere of Angelina Jolie and Johnny Depp in “The Tourist”? I can’t tell you anything about it. The press was banned from the inside of the theater and the party.
This, my friends, is a bad, bad sign. No one has seen this movie except last night’s audience, and some junketeers who were flown to Paris for a lavish you know what. Not one comment has been posted on Rotten Tomatoes. either.
The movie, directed by Oscar winner (“The Lives of Others”-Best Foreign Film) Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, opens in four days. So far, nothing has turned up about it anywhere. Talk about keeping a tight lid on a film!
My spy at the screening, usually optimistic about everything, told me: “It’s not very good. It’s just a lot of close ups of Angeline Jolie, getting on and off boats. Not much happens. It’s a strange performance.”
Negative remarks are starting to appear on the Internet Movie Data Base (www.imdb.com) message board for the film.
With international locales and two $20 million stars, “The Tourist” has to really earn a lot of money this weekend if it’s going to earn out.
Sony is having a good fall season with Oscar-bound “The Social Network” already over $90 million and growing.
But Sony also has Reese Witherspoon coming in James L. Brooks‘s “How Do You Know?” And the word on that film is even worse than it is on this one. Could Sony/Columbia Pictures be bracing itself for two big duds for Christmas?
Listen, it happens. A year from now they could have the two biggest holiday hits. It’s all about timing.
Brooks–many feel– is a genius, responsible for “The Mary Tyler Moore Show,” “Taxi,” “The Simpsons,” Tracey Ullmann’s shows, “As Good As It Gets,” “Terms of Endearment” and “Broadcast News.” But he’s had missteps, particularly with his most recent outing, “Spanglish.”
PS The premiere must have been weird. There were so few people to photograph aside from the cast of “The Tourist” (Jolie, Depp, Paul Bettany, celebrity spouses Brad Pitt and Jennifer Connelly) that the picture agency included shots of “Access Hollywood” correspondent Tony Potts.
UPDATE: Today’s Hollywood Reporter online has a total red carpet puff piece “story” about “what Jolie said to Depp on set” of the movie. This is hilarious. Only the Reporter and Variety were permitted to send reps into the movie. Puff, puff, puff.
