George Clooney Hobbles Around Premiere After Crash

Actors - if you ever star in a low-key thriller about all kinds of non-specific Serious Things and you want to boost publicity for the premiere, why not try busting up your ribs falling off a motorbike like George Clooney?

Up until Friday, there can't have been many people all that excited about the premiere for George Clooney's new movie Michael Clayton - about, as far as we can tell, an anxious lawyer running up a hill to make an important point about something serious - but since the premiere marked the first public outing for George Clooney after fracturing his ribs in a motorbike accident, the whole world paid attention to the Michael Clayton premiere just to see the extent of George Clooney's injuries. And, by hurting himself right when the movie needed hyping most, there's a chance that George Clooney may have started a Hollywood trend. So you know who to thanks when Tom Cruise invariably blows his own foot off with a shotgun a week before Lions For Lambs gets released.

There are three types of George Clooney movie - the painfully earnest movie that allows George Clooney to yammer on about international aid in the middle of the Golden Globes, the smug comedies and the shorter 30-second films that air on TV between the programmes where George Clooney tries to sell you Nescafe or Fiats. And, although he's dangerously prolific at the latter, George Clooney's new movie Michael Clayton is wedged firmly in the former. At least that's what we think - the movie title Michael Clayton is so vague it may as well been called Boonoo Sparrow or Free-Standing Lampshade - but it doesn't really matter about what Michael Clayton is about, because people are only pretending to care about it to see how badly George Clooney's shattered ribs jut out of his tuxedo during its premiere.

And that's because of the George Clooney motorbike crash of last week where, for the uninitiated, George Clooney's motorbike was hit by a car in New Jersey causing Clooney to fracture a rib and his girlfriend Sarah Larson to fracture a toe. Although reports are suggesting that no charges have been made against George Clooney for the crash - and the driver of the car his bike collided with won't be seeking damages - the motorbike accident did mean that George Clooney had to attend the premiere of Michael Clayton hopped up to wazoo on bacteria-destroying aminoglycosides, as People reports:

George Clooney was still sore and girlfriend Sarah Larson hobbled on crutches and hid a black eye behind makeup from their motorcycle accident as they attended the Monday night premiere of Clooney's Michael Clayton. "I'm a little dinged up – lots of Neosporin," Clooney told PEOPLE at the New York event. "I'm definitely not jogging or doing jumping jacks." He added that he and Larson are "just resting." "You don't really want to rub or massage parts that are broken or anything," he said.  

See kids, that's why George Clooney is mandom's manliest man - not only did he break bones falling off his motorbike, but he's also able to laugh his injuries off while attending a function. Not like Kylie Minogue, who cancels concerts just because she's got a sore throat. George Clooney is much more of a man than Kylie Minogue. And don't forget that scars are sexy - especially when they're of the 'disfigured ribcage' variety and accompanied by constant laboured rattling wheezing - and that's just going to increase George Clooney's sexiness in the long term. Plus George Clooney's motorbike crash has helped raise awareness of Michael Clayton too, even though nobody has a bastard clue what it's actually about.

One thing's for sure though - George Clooney wore a beard at the Michael Clayton premiere. That means he really, really wants another Oscar. 

Read more:

Injured George Clooney, Girlfriend Attend Premiere - People