Veni, vidi but not quite vinci
Few movie openings in recent memory have created such a stir even before it has opened. Stand down, "Passion of the Christ" and "The Last Temptation of Christ".
Several countries have delayed the opening (India) or banned it outride (The Philippines). Bishops tell churchgoers that it their religious duty not to watch this movie. Opus Dei leaders go on TV to defend their cause. US churches call on moviegoers to spend their ticket money on an animated feature instead. Others yet claim the occasion as an opportunity to witness to non-Christians.
Such is the circus of furore and hysteria that made Ron Howard’s “The Da Vinci Code” the most highly- anticipated movie opening in recent times. And the verdict after all that ballyhoo? Yawn…I’d rather sit through a 2 ½ hour sermon. In latin.
Those who read Dan Brown’s fiction novel might have also noted its similarity to action-thriller movies. The fast-paced action; the wealth of ridiculously simplified facts; the clunky, graceless dialogue; the stereotyped, likeable characters (Robert Langdon, the hero, is compared physically to Harrison Ford). You put the book down and think, my God, this would be such a great movie! I wonder what Harrison Ford’s doing after Indiana Jones…
After last week’s screening, the general excitement seems to have deflated into widespread grumbling and not a little bit of audible smirking from the religious factions. And I concur. "The Da Vinci Code" is guilty of that most terrible of cinematic sins - not of blasphemy, but of boredom.
Both the book and the film open with the same scene in the Grand Louvre - that of a terrified Sauniere, the museum’s curator, being pursued by a shadowy monk/zealot who turns out to be an assassin from Opus Dei (played by a whitewashed Paul Bettany). Renaissance madonnas and butchered Christs watch melancholically as Sauniere is gunned down in what turns out to be the film’s only functional action scene. The rest is pretty much downhill.
For a start, there’s the anaemic interaction between Langdon (Tom Hanks) and French cryptologist Sophie (Audrey Tatou). It’s not so much Scully and Mulder as it is Scully and…well, Scully. Tatou, otherwise a fine actress, seems severely hampered by speaking in a foreign language. Although Jean Reno’s character, police inspector Bezu Fache (even the names sound like anagrams) doesn’t do much better despite having most of his dialogue in his native French. But even a badly-coiffed Tom Hanks, who hasn’t been in a high-profile movie role lately (unless you count last year’s festive train-wreck, "The Polar Express"), never quite manages to grab our attention. For reasons that will become clear later in the film, the pair are supposed to have a platonic relationship. However, it simply doesn’t look like they’re having much fun onscreen.
And so, it’s up to the secondary characters to save the film. Thank God for Ian McKellen! His Professor Teabing is such a combination of high camp and faux Shakespearean gravity, it’s a breath of fresh air in a long, stagnant evening. Teabing is every conceivable cliché of an oxford don, but Mckellen manages to play it to heart’s content. Likewise, Bettany also seems to be enjoying his caricature of a zealot with a haunted past. He looks like he needs a large syringe of vitamin E, but is quite tintillating in the scenes where he chastises himself in the nude with a nasty-looking whip.
In fact, it’s the hammy acting rather than the serious themes which give the movie most of its life. The problem of adapting a book like "The Da Vinci Code" lies in translating large amounts of crucial information to a visual format. For the complex historical bits, part of the problem is solved National Geographic-style by enacting flashbacks narrated by one of the characters. These work well for the most part, adding a visual richness which is oddly absent in a movie with so many wonderful shooting locations. Although the manner in which the narration is done gets rather formulaic - someone makes an offhand remark (usually Sophie, whose job is apparently to be clueless) which generates a controversial remark (usually Teabing - “Actually my dear, Christ was a woman”), which is then the cue for a re-enacted explanation. “But I thought Hitler was a cold-blooded murderer who wanted to rule the world.” “Ah, but that’s what the Allies WANT you to believe, my dear. You see, the British and the Americans faked the War of Independence in order to divert attention from their ultimate goal of world-domination, but a certain failed German artist uncovered the truth…”
The problem is with the movie’s pacing, which gets unreasonably slow in crucial parts. Positioning Teabing’s entertaining exposition of the Great Big Secret in the middle of the film ultimately causes the film to lose so much steam that it never quite recovers from it. Howard should take a page from JJ Abrams (TV’s Lost) in the art of unfolding revelations while keeping back just enough to keep the audience interested. Finally, it is the film’s slavish attachment to the book in communicating the main ideas through dialogue that does it in. On the page, it appears illuminating, but on the screen it’s just prosaic. There is simply too much talking and precious little meaningful visual story-telling. Howard’s attempt to soften the bite of the more controversial issues by inserting snippets of moderate views from Langdon or Sophie comes across as unnecessary padding and only serves to further weigh the action down.
Much of the book’s allure lies in mesmerising the reader with tantalising riddles, exploding long-held ideas, and allowing the reader’s imagination to run wild amidst well-known but intriguing locations. This is where the film falls flat - by failing to deliver the same thrills that made the book so popular. Perhaps Ron Howard should have paid less attention to tackling thorny issues and more to telling an entertaining yarn without trying to be equitable. Which is, after all, exactly what Dan Brown did.
Several countries have delayed the opening (India) or banned it outride (The Philippines). Bishops tell churchgoers that it their religious duty not to watch this movie. Opus Dei leaders go on TV to defend their cause. US churches call on moviegoers to spend their ticket money on an animated feature instead. Others yet claim the occasion as an opportunity to witness to non-Christians.
Such is the circus of furore and hysteria that made Ron Howard’s “The Da Vinci Code” the most highly- anticipated movie opening in recent times. And the verdict after all that ballyhoo? Yawn…I’d rather sit through a 2 ½ hour sermon. In latin.
Those who read Dan Brown’s fiction novel might have also noted its similarity to action-thriller movies. The fast-paced action; the wealth of ridiculously simplified facts; the clunky, graceless dialogue; the stereotyped, likeable characters (Robert Langdon, the hero, is compared physically to Harrison Ford). You put the book down and think, my God, this would be such a great movie! I wonder what Harrison Ford’s doing after Indiana Jones…
After last week’s screening, the general excitement seems to have deflated into widespread grumbling and not a little bit of audible smirking from the religious factions. And I concur. "The Da Vinci Code" is guilty of that most terrible of cinematic sins - not of blasphemy, but of boredom.
Both the book and the film open with the same scene in the Grand Louvre - that of a terrified Sauniere, the museum’s curator, being pursued by a shadowy monk/zealot who turns out to be an assassin from Opus Dei (played by a whitewashed Paul Bettany). Renaissance madonnas and butchered Christs watch melancholically as Sauniere is gunned down in what turns out to be the film’s only functional action scene. The rest is pretty much downhill.
For a start, there’s the anaemic interaction between Langdon (Tom Hanks) and French cryptologist Sophie (Audrey Tatou). It’s not so much Scully and Mulder as it is Scully and…well, Scully. Tatou, otherwise a fine actress, seems severely hampered by speaking in a foreign language. Although Jean Reno’s character, police inspector Bezu Fache (even the names sound like anagrams) doesn’t do much better despite having most of his dialogue in his native French. But even a badly-coiffed Tom Hanks, who hasn’t been in a high-profile movie role lately (unless you count last year’s festive train-wreck, "The Polar Express"), never quite manages to grab our attention. For reasons that will become clear later in the film, the pair are supposed to have a platonic relationship. However, it simply doesn’t look like they’re having much fun onscreen.
And so, it’s up to the secondary characters to save the film. Thank God for Ian McKellen! His Professor Teabing is such a combination of high camp and faux Shakespearean gravity, it’s a breath of fresh air in a long, stagnant evening. Teabing is every conceivable cliché of an oxford don, but Mckellen manages to play it to heart’s content. Likewise, Bettany also seems to be enjoying his caricature of a zealot with a haunted past. He looks like he needs a large syringe of vitamin E, but is quite tintillating in the scenes where he chastises himself in the nude with a nasty-looking whip.
In fact, it’s the hammy acting rather than the serious themes which give the movie most of its life. The problem of adapting a book like "The Da Vinci Code" lies in translating large amounts of crucial information to a visual format. For the complex historical bits, part of the problem is solved National Geographic-style by enacting flashbacks narrated by one of the characters. These work well for the most part, adding a visual richness which is oddly absent in a movie with so many wonderful shooting locations. Although the manner in which the narration is done gets rather formulaic - someone makes an offhand remark (usually Sophie, whose job is apparently to be clueless) which generates a controversial remark (usually Teabing - “Actually my dear, Christ was a woman”), which is then the cue for a re-enacted explanation. “But I thought Hitler was a cold-blooded murderer who wanted to rule the world.” “Ah, but that’s what the Allies WANT you to believe, my dear. You see, the British and the Americans faked the War of Independence in order to divert attention from their ultimate goal of world-domination, but a certain failed German artist uncovered the truth…”
The problem is with the movie’s pacing, which gets unreasonably slow in crucial parts. Positioning Teabing’s entertaining exposition of the Great Big Secret in the middle of the film ultimately causes the film to lose so much steam that it never quite recovers from it. Howard should take a page from JJ Abrams (TV’s Lost) in the art of unfolding revelations while keeping back just enough to keep the audience interested. Finally, it is the film’s slavish attachment to the book in communicating the main ideas through dialogue that does it in. On the page, it appears illuminating, but on the screen it’s just prosaic. There is simply too much talking and precious little meaningful visual story-telling. Howard’s attempt to soften the bite of the more controversial issues by inserting snippets of moderate views from Langdon or Sophie comes across as unnecessary padding and only serves to further weigh the action down.
Much of the book’s allure lies in mesmerising the reader with tantalising riddles, exploding long-held ideas, and allowing the reader’s imagination to run wild amidst well-known but intriguing locations. This is where the film falls flat - by failing to deliver the same thrills that made the book so popular. Perhaps Ron Howard should have paid less attention to tackling thorny issues and more to telling an entertaining yarn without trying to be equitable. Which is, after all, exactly what Dan Brown did.