No wonder you had to work Knight and Day to promote it - your new film's a flop, Tom!

By Georgina Littlejohn

Box office flop: Cameron Diaz and Tom Cruise in a scene from Knight And Day, which has been the subject of scathing reviews


If the general public haven't grown sick of the sight of Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz by now, then the critics most definitely have.

For the past month, the two actors have travelled to Europe and South America spending every minute of their working day promoting their new film Knight and Day.

But it would appear that their tour - which even included an appearance on Top Gear - was all in vain.

The film is released across the UK today and follows the adventures of girl-next-door June Havens, played by Diaz, who accidentally meets rogue spy Roy Miller, played by Cruise, and gets tangled up in his latest mission.

And if the poor US reception is anything to go on, it may prove to be a box office flop here too.

Especially if fans take the press reviews on board before deciding to part with their hard-earned cash to sit through Hollywood's latest action offering.


Bad geography: The pair filmed a scene while involved in the Pamplona bull run - which directors have set in Seville


The Daily Mail's Chris Tookey only awarded the film one star out of five and gave it a verdict of 'far-fetched farrago for the very easily pleased'.

He said: 'Even to try and make sense of the storyline is to risk incurable brain damage.

'Ok, I know Knight and Day is meant to be escapism. And I would have been willing to go along with this as harmless fun if the dialogue had been witty or the whole thing had been played as a spoof of idiotic action movies; but most of the cast behave as if it's The Bourne Identity.'

He added that Cruise 'emanates a terrifying vacuity' while Diaz, whose career is looking 'increasingly desperate', comes across as a 'demented duck'.


Worldwide promotion: Diaz and Cruise travelled to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil and Munich, Germany to attend the film's premieres


It didn't fare much better in the Telegraph, which gave it three out of five stars, with the reviewer describing it as a 'slippery wannabe of a film' with a storyline that is 'utter bobbins, a mere pretext for shoot-outs and cartoonish chase scenes'.

Cruelly, they also said that while Diaz, 37, displayed a 'beach-bodaciousness', facially she looked 'much older' than her 47-year-old co-star.

Peter Bradshaw in the Guardian awarded it two stars out of five and said for a summer movie, it was 'a bit of a washout'.

He said it had a 'feisty start' but it soon began to 'run very low on gas', being light on 'high-quality gags, and real human interest between the leads'.


London's turn: They also touched down in the capital for the British premiere in Leicester Square


TNT Magazine said the movie was Cruise's attempt 'convince the world he’s not a joyless control freak', and a 'PR exercise that might have worked if the material wasn’t so damned formulaic'.

New Statesman even went so far as to suggest that Diaz and Cruise had committed 'career suicide' and 'if they come back from this one, Lazarus will have nothing on them'.


Reasonably priced: Cruise and Diaz even made an appearance on Top Gear as part of their promotional tour


The film's production costs exceeded $125million, with many more millions spent on promotion, took five years to bring to the big screen, brought 12 writers on board for the script and changed its lead cast members several times.

Cruise is even believed to have cut his advance from $20million to $11million.

US audiences turned their noses up, with the movie taking just $20.5million in its opening weekend, believed to be the worst result for an action film starring Cruise in 20 years.


Bonjour! The pair even muscled in on the Tour de France as they congratulated Astana team rider Alberto Contador of Spain


source: dailymail