The Da Vinci Code
May 31st, 2006 at 16:52
Shortly before winning big on an ItBox the other day (£5!), JD, Fundar and myself went to see The Da Vinci Code film. It was good because it was like a book, but I didn’t have to make an effort to read words to understand the plot.
Do I really need to put in a spoiler warning? No, I won’t. I think I’ll enjoy receieving angry messages saying “WTF u ruined it” after, instead.
I wasn’t entirely sure what to expect, what with the apparent bad reviews the film has recieved, and that fact that I’m not a London taxi-driver, and indeed, I like to think I can cope with things that are a little more, erm, taxing, that what a cabbie would read. I’m aware this assertion falls apart when you consider that I didn’t actually read it, but merely watched a scarecrow playing Tom Hanks playing the man who knows about old symbols and that.
It was quite good though- Magneto/Gandalf being typecast as the old, powerful and respected man was good, as he suited the role, and the romantic subplot (between Hanks and the woman, not Jesus and his wife) was heavily underplayed- hooray!
It was a bit odd that the bloke who was murdered at the start had time to wander around the Louvre thinking up hidden messages and putting them on the paintings- if I were him, I’d have spent most of the time shouting, “Ouch! My stomach really hurts, where I’ve been shot. I’m going to slouch forwards in agony for a bit.”. It was also strange how Tom Hanks spent his time worrying about solving some crackpot’s puzzle rather than the fact that he was being hunted down for murder.
I daresay the “backstory” flashbacks about the whole “Jesus got married and that” were better than the actual story- much like how in Nineteen Eighty-Four, Goldstein’s “Book” is the best part, rather than the whole “Look at what Winston does” stuff. I can certainly see why the church hates the Code. Despite being someone who considers themselves quite knowledgable when it comes to history, the lines between fact and “Dan Brown filling in the blanks” was quite blurred. For example, there’s some Templar Knights who lead one of the crusades. The crusades happend- but did this order of knights actually exist? The stuff hidden in “The Last Supper”, that was explained by Magneto, was interesting, but could well be bollocks. I’m too lazy to actually research this, so I’m going to take Dan Brown’s word as, erm, gospel.
I also think Doctor Octopus should have retained his metal arms for his role as a churchy-man (that’s a technical term) who needs to protect the big secret.
Overall, I enjoyed the film- it’s certainly no Matrix or Downfall- they’re two of my favourite films that act as a comparison on the Kelkoo in my mind. I like the Matrix more than Downfall, but I thought if I mention a foreign language film it’ll make me sound more intelligent. The Da Vinci Code is much better than the other book-to-film adaption I’ve seen (assuming the Lord of the Rings books were novelisations of the films), Harry Potter 2. As far as I’m concerned, Warner Brother owe me two and a half hours of my life back.
Ten out of eight. (That’s an anagram of eight out of ten).
Post to: [ del.icio.us ][ Digg it ][ Furl ][ Netscape ][ Newsvine ][ reddit ][ StumbleUpon ][ Yahoo MyWeb ]Categories: Films |
