Final Word from Tuesday, December 27, 2011
The new "Mission: Impossible" movie is a bunch of action-packed nonsense, butit's still great fun. Especially for Prague residents, who will spend much of the firsthalf of the film trying to discern the streets of their city. Part of the film was shot inPrague, but - egads! - it's supposed to be Moscow. Perhaps this is Tom Cruise's revengefor being overcharged in 1995 for use of Liechtenstein Palace. Václav Havel saidat the time that Cruise should have been allowed to use the palace for free, becauseof the publicity it would bring the city. This time, Cruise took a reported Kč 57m intax breaks and then turned Prague Castle into the Kremlin. He hung Russian flags inthe courtyard of the "Kremlin" and marched past the statue of TGM into the SpanishHall as if it were Vladimir Lenin or Putin. Czechs won't see the EU flag flying at theCastle, but now they'll be able to see the Russian one there. All in good fun, right?
Glossary of difficult words
action-packed - full of activity or exciting events;
to discern - to perceive or recognize something;
egads - expressing surprise, anger or affirmation;
TGM - Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk.