With Jason Bourne hanging up his hands-free kit for the foreseeable future, there’s a gap in Hollywood’s schedules for a new spy movie – and Warner Bros. think they may have found it, with The Tourist, a forthcoming novel they’ve just picked up and dropped in George Clooney’s lap.
The novel, by Olen Steinhauer, revolves around a plot we’ve almost certainly never seen before – it’s about a spy who must uncover a conspiracy after he’s accused of a crime he didn’t commit. Yep, that’s original.
Anyway, the novel is said to be in the vein of a John Le Carre or a Graham Greene, which indicates excellent quality, and may explain why Clooney is involved. For Warners have bought the property for Clooney to produce, along with Grant Heslov via their Smoke House production company – the same Smoke House that yesterday got involved in Farragut North, with Leonardo DiCaprio.
No word yet on whether Clooney will do anything other than produce, but given that Gorgeous George’s mere involvement is likely to suggest a project is worth keeping an eye on, we’ll do just that.
Although we'd imagine that by the time this movie comes to the big screen, the title will have changed - mostly because it clashes with the Hugh Jackman-Ewan McGregor thriller of the same name that will be released next year. Seems that Hollywood's The Tourist industry is thriving...