“A world where somehow everything is beautiful”–Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck on THE TOURIST

In a recent interview with MTV News, Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, director of The Tourist (which stars Johnny Depp and Angelina Jolie), was asked how his new film differs from his Oscar-winning The Lives of Others. “[The Tourist] was very different genre-wise and just the feel of the film, but that was part of the fun for me,” the director replied. “I feel it’s more fun to try out something completely different, and after you’ve done something more heavy, to do something light and breezy, it was almost a kind of self-therapy there.”

MTV: What do you think will resonate most with audiences?

Von Donnersmarck: I think that they’ll love just seeing a world where somehow everything is beautiful, not so much in a way that seems unrealistic. All of the things we show in the film could happen like they do in the film and could look the way they do, but even if there’s a scene with 500 extras, every single extra will have been designed and sculpted by the most fantastic designers that Hollywood and Italy have to offer, so I hope people will feel transported into a world that is as beautiful as it could be, that’s what I was aiming for. Most of all, I just hope they will be transformed by — as I was on the set — by the incredible chemistry and the joy and love between our marvelous actors, between Angie and Johnny, and Paul and Timothy Dalton and Steven Berkhoff, all the incredible actors that we had.

The photo above is a newly-released still from The Tourist, which certainly gives credibility to the director’s claim of rendering a world “where somehow everything is beautiful.” To see a larger version of Frank and Elise dancing, CLICK HERE. The Zone thanks Emma for the picture and the MTV interview; you can read more about The Tourist on the Zone’s News & Views forum.