Actually it reminds me of a very well known Cartier-Bresson shot, but with added complications of colour. And it works.
I would imagine that if Michael had come back from Thera/Santorini with the usual clichéd stuff us unknowns can get away with, he'd have been mauled.
On the other hand, I've got similar shots to the sunset one in my "ho hum" file :-)