Avoid Jolie, Depp”s ”Tourist” trap

LOS ANGELES: What”s served under a label promising first-class Champagne tastes like last night”s prosecco in “The Tourist,” a zero-chemistry pairing of Angelina Jolie and Johnny Depp that opens in theaters Friday.

Staggeringly misjudged in virtually every department, from the wannabe effervescent script to Depp”s dopey hairdo, the Sony release stands as an object lesson in the perils of succumbing to the siren call of big-time Hollywood filmmaking for a foreign director with one art house hit behind him. The studio”s publicity machine will work overtime to drum up some initial business, but “Tourist” will fall into a trap of its own making.

After receiving near-universal acclaim and a foreign-language Oscar for his 2006 debut feature, “The Lives of Others,” a quietly riveting suspense drama set in East Germany, Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, who grew up partially in the US and speaks perfect English, was inundated with offers from all quarters but wanted to choose carefully. After such a long delay, for him to have finally settled on this trifling romp over the rooftops and in the canals of Venice is stupefying to say the least and will give plenty of ammunition to the small band of detractors of his earlier outing.

Embalmed in makeup and elegant gowns that puts one in mind of Loretta Young and employing a reserved English accent that allows no possibility of genuine emotional expression, Jolie plays Elise, the object of much male attention in the opening scenes, which is no surprise even though the men in question are all surveillance experts intent upon following her every move in the hope she”ll lead them to her criminal lover, one Alexander Pearce. After she receives a note instructing her to take a morning train from Paris to Venice, the chase is on, and she knows it.

With every guy on board keen for Elise to sit next to them, she instead gloms on to the scruffy, rather forlorn-looking Frank Tupelo, a mild-mannered math teacher from Wisconsin. Baffled and unnerved by her attentions, Frank is thoroughly unequipped to partake in the kind of witty, insinuating dialogue expected in stories of train-bound intrigue. Not that Donnersmarck, having revamped previous scripts by the estimable Julian Fellowes and Christopher McQuarrie, has written any. But it”s woefully clear from their first scene together that, not only is there nothing clicking between the stars, but that the entire enterprise is madly artificial and silly, that whatever games are being played here are not going to be fun.

Donnersmarck, along with his multitude of producers, must have dreamed that, with two of the most glamorous and best-looking stars in the business, he had a shot of making a modern Hitchcock romantic thriller along the lines of “The 39 Steps,” “To Catch a Thief” and “North by Northwest.” Well, dream on. No one here evinces the slightest feel for that sort of sly sophistication. Instead, we get tiresome scenes of the hapless Frank, who”s presumed to be the much sought-after Alexander, being pursued by goons of a Scotland Yard contingent led by Paul Bettany and by those of a gangster tycoon (Steven Berkoff) from whom Alexander stole a fortune and who you”d believe to be Russian but for his British accent.

Least accountable of all is the growing affection Elise seems to be feeling for the ineffectual Frank. Or is she pretending? One minute she invites him into her sumptuous suite at the Danieli, the next she makes him sleep on the couch. After telling him to go home and dropping him at the airport, she then dances with him at an elegant ball. But no matter as the film manages to build nary a trace of interest in either character.

Looking puffy and unassertive, Depp never has registered less effectively in his entire film career. For Jolie”s part, the nature of her role doesn”t allow her to show her hand to anyone, severely limiting the extent of characterization. This is where wit and lively banter would come in handy, but this is more difficult to appropriate from old movies than is format.

Surely Donnersmarck did not set out to remake Death in Venice, but artistically, that is what has been achieved.

Death toll of south Russia flood rises to 11

MOSCOW: The death toll of the floods in southern Russia’s Krasnodar region has risen to 11, local authorities said Saturday.

According to the latest information, 11 people died and three are missing, a source from the local administration was quoted by RIA Novosti news agency as saying.

Earlier reports said the flood has killed eight people.

Torrential rains in mountainous areas caused rivers to overflow, flooding 21 villages. About 300 people were evacuated and a state of emergency was imposed in the area earlier.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev ordered Regional Development Minister Viktor Basargin to assess the damage caused by the flood and take measure to help those affected.

The regional governor Alexander Tkachyov has pledged to pay compensation to affected families as soon as possible. AGENCIES

U.S.-Russian crew dock at space station

MOSCOW: A U.S.-Russian crew in a Russian Soyuz space ship docked at the International Space Station on Sunday, the Russian space agency Roscosmos said.

The Soyuz TMA-18 docked successfully two days after blasting off from the Baikonur cosmodrome in the Kazakh steppe with a crew of three onboard.

The spacecraft, carrying U.S. astronaut Tracy Caldwell Dyson and Russian cosmonauts Alexander Skvortsov and Mikhail Korniyenko, automatically docked at 0524 GMT, according to a statement on the Roscosmos website.

U.S.-Russian crew blasts off to space station

MOSCOW: A U.S.-Russian crew blasted off to the International Space Station on board a Russian Soyuzspace ship on Friday, starting a half-a-year odyssey in orbit.

Russians Alexander Skvortsov and Mikhail Korniyenko, and U.S. astronaut Tracy Caldwell Dyson lifted off from Russia”s Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan as planned, at 8:04 a.m. Moscow time.

McQueen’s Collection Dazzles Paris One Last Time

Behind closed windows in this grand Paris townhouse Alexander McQueen came back to life one more time. For fifteen minutes, a select number of guests viewed the collection that Alexander McQueen started but never lived to complete.
A true celebration of life, the collection revealed a feast of colours and textures celebrating his skill and passion for spectacle. Inspired by the Old Masters of painting, fabric was drawn back to reveal gold embroidery, a feather skirt or a glimpse of flesh.
Prints reflected the gory fantasies of Hieronymous Bosch, while long, floating gowns traced the soft sweetness of a Botticelli Venus.
Known as the rebel of fashion, McQueen shot to fame with provocative ideas such as low-cut “bumster” trousers, but his later work was dazzling and bewitching rather than shocking. The designer took his own life in February, reportedly inconsolable over the death of his mother earlier last month and with a history of depression. The inquest into his death has resumed.

Lagrimas Translation

TrendPK.com Lagrimas Translation: Of the pioneers of Italian cinema voice! The worst movie title translations to foreign film, the Italian language is the “SEA-ME-T lasci cancello” (If you leave me, and I deleted you!). The original title is “Eternal Sunshine of the spotless mind”, the poem “Eloisa to Abelard” by Alexander Pope. [...]

Designer Alexander McQueen Deadbbody Found

TrendPK.com Designer Alexander McQueen  Deadbbody Found:LONDON ,His runway shows were often like performance pieces, One featured models with headwear made of trash. Another showed off 10-inch heels shaped like lobster claws.
At the pinnacle of his success, British fashion designer Alexander McQueen was found dead in his home Thursday, days [...]

Alexander Mcqueen Lady Gaga

Alexander Mcqueen Lady Gaga, As soon as pictures of Alexander McQueen’s terrifying lobster-claw shaped “Armadillo” shoes (Spring 2010) hit the Internet, fashion-savvy bloggers began making guesses about who would be the first to wear them. All ye who guessed Lady Gaga.

Today, the official video for Gaga’s latest single, “Bad Romance.” hit the web. It’s typical Gaga – beautiful, scary, and kind of awesome: Gaga gets kidnapped by evil supermodels who sell her off to the Russian mafia. She also wears a crapload of couture through her trying ordeal.

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Alexander Mcqueen Lady Gaga was first posted on February 11, 2010 at 10:16 pm.

Alex Lambert American Idol

TrendPK.com Alex Lambert American Idol:Once again it’s Lambert in our favorite program American Idol. But, this time it is not Adam Lambert, the runner up of American Idol 8, we are seeing new Lambert named Alex Lambert.
Alex Lambert or Alexander Lambert one of the 24 final participants [...]

Ricky Stokes News

Ricky Stokes News, Alexander Rae “Alec” Baldwin III (born April 3, 1958) is an American film and television actor. An actor comfortable in both lead and supporting roles, he has appeared in numerous Hollywood films, from Beetlejuice and The Hunt for Red October in the 1980s to the Martin Scorsese films The Aviator and The Departed in the 2000.

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Ricky Stokes News was first posted on January 29, 2010 at 8:46 pm.

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