The Da Vinci Code
Y
May 17, 2006
CANNES -- For those who hate Dan Brown's best-selling symbology thriller "The Da Vinci Code," the eagerly awaited and much-hyped movie version beautifully exposes all its flaws and nightmares of logic. For those who love the book's page-turning intensity, the movie version heightens Brown's mischievous interweaving of genre action, historical facts and utter fictions. In other words, for those who bear witness to the film "The Da Vinci Code," what you see depends on what you believe. Kinda like religion itself.
Strictly as a movie and ignoring the current swirl of controversy no amount of studio money could ever buy, the Ron Howard-directed film features one of Tom Hanks' more remote, even wooden performances in a role that admittedly demands all the wrong sorts of things from a thriller protagonist; an only slightly more animated performance from his French co-star, Audrey Tautou; and polished Hollywood production values where camera cranes sweep viewers up to God-like points of view and famous locations and deliciously sinister interiors heighten tension where the movie threatens to turn into a historical treatise. The movie really only catches fire after an hour, when Ian McKellen hobbles on the scene as the story's Sphinx-like Sir Leigh Teabing. Here is the one actor having fun with his role and playing a character rather than a piece to a puzzle.
True believers and those who want to understand what all the fuss is about will jam cinemas worldwide in the coming weeks in sufficient numbers so as to fulfill probably even the most optimistic projections of Sony execs.
But the movie is so drenched in dialogue musing over arcane mythological and historical lore and scenes grow so static that even camera movement can't disguise the dramatic inertia. Such sins could cut into those rosy projections.
For those who vacationed on Mars for the past few years, "The Da Vinci Code" is the second of Brown's thrillers starring Harvard professor of iconography and religious art Robert Langdon (Hanks). The books seek to put contemporary ticking bombs into dusty historical disputes. In this one, the murder of a highly respected curator in the Louvre in Paris, where Langdon fortuitously happens to be while on a speaking engagement, embroils the professor in a race against time to locate nothing less than the Holy Grail.
His companion is police cryptologist Sophie Neveu (Tautou), and his seeming nemesis is bulldog police captain Bezu Fache (Jean Reno, largely wasted), who for no plausible reason believes Langdon to be the killer. But other potential villains loom: Jet-setting Bishop Aringarosa (Alfred Molina), from the ultraconservative Opus Dei branch of Catholicism, and Silas, an albino-monk assassin (Paul Bettany).
The plot is driven not by its characters but by solutions to puzzles, the breaking of codes, interpreting covert references in works of art and a dazzling display of historical knowledge, all of which works terrifically in the novel but puts the brakes to all screen action. Hanks' character is far too reactive and contemplative for a movie action hero, and the cliched nature of those drifting in and out of his orbit hits home with jolting simplicity.
Screen adapter Akiva Goldsman has definitely punched up Brown's third act. He has actually improved on the novel -- at least for those who buy in to the historical controversy that Jesus left behind a royal French bloodline -- by giving the story a broader, more fulfilling payoff than the novel. If one doesn't buy into that controversy, then the story becomes just that much more forced and corrupt. (The final revelation produced a few titters in the first press audience to see the film.)
Howard and Goldsman can't do much, though, with mostly colorless characters designed around idiosyncrasies and weird scholarly talents -- sort of academic X-Men -- rather than flesh-and-blood personalities. No chemistry exists between the hero and heroine, and motivation remains a troubling sore point. Why does the innocent professor flee? Why is Sophie so eager to help? Why is anyone doing what he does when so many characters and subplots turn into red herrings?
One questionable "cinematic" addition to the film are flashbacks to ancient biblical and medieval historical tableaus in the Holy Land and Europe that illustrate Prof. Langdon's continuous lectures on religious history. These look as if some prankster spliced scenes from last year's "Kingdom of Heaven" into the film as a bad joke.
Howard proves a smart choice as a director because his middlebrow tastes inspire him to go for broad strokes and forget making any real sense of these logic-busters. But why did he allow such a solid, attractive cast to turn in such stiff, unappealing performances? Salvatore Totino's glistening cinematography, Allan Cameron's assured production design and Hans Zimmer's driving score are definitely pluses. Yet "Da Vinci" never rises to the level of a guilty pleasure. Too much guilt. Not enough pleasure.
THE DA VINCI CODE
Columbia Pictures
Imagine Entertainment
Credits: Director: Ron Howard; Screenwriter: Akiva Goldsman; Based on the novel by: Dan Brown; Producers: Brian Grazer, John Calley; Executive producers: Todd Hallowell, Dan Brown; Director of photography: Salvatore Totino; Production designer: Allan Cameron; Music: Hans Zimmer; Costumes: Daniel Orlandi; Editors: Dan Hanley, Mike Hill. Cast: Robert Langdon: Tom Hanks; Sophie Neveu: Audrey Tautou; Sir Leigh Teabing: Ian McKellen; Captain Fache: Jean Reno; Silas: Paul Bettany; Bishop Aringarosa: Alfred Molina; Vernet: Jurgen Prochnow; Remy Jean: Jean-Yves Berteloot.
MPAA rating PG-13, running time 147 minutes.
Strictly as a movie and ignoring the current swirl of controversy no amount of studio money could ever buy, the Ron Howard-directed film features one of Tom Hanks' more remote, even wooden performances in a role that admittedly demands all the wrong sorts of things from a thriller protagonist; an only slightly more animated performance from his French co-star, Audrey Tautou; and polished Hollywood production values where camera cranes sweep viewers up to God-like points of view and famous locations and deliciously sinister interiors heighten tension where the movie threatens to turn into a historical treatise. The movie really only catches fire after an hour, when Ian McKellen hobbles on the scene as the story's Sphinx-like Sir Leigh Teabing. Here is the one actor having fun with his role and playing a character rather than a piece to a puzzle.
True believers and those who want to understand what all the fuss is about will jam cinemas worldwide in the coming weeks in sufficient numbers so as to fulfill probably even the most optimistic projections of Sony execs.
But the movie is so drenched in dialogue musing over arcane mythological and historical lore and scenes grow so static that even camera movement can't disguise the dramatic inertia. Such sins could cut into those rosy projections.
For those who vacationed on Mars for the past few years, "The Da Vinci Code" is the second of Brown's thrillers starring Harvard professor of iconography and religious art Robert Langdon (Hanks). The books seek to put contemporary ticking bombs into dusty historical disputes. In this one, the murder of a highly respected curator in the Louvre in Paris, where Langdon fortuitously happens to be while on a speaking engagement, embroils the professor in a race against time to locate nothing less than the Holy Grail.
His companion is police cryptologist Sophie Neveu (Tautou), and his seeming nemesis is bulldog police captain Bezu Fache (Jean Reno, largely wasted), who for no plausible reason believes Langdon to be the killer. But other potential villains loom: Jet-setting Bishop Aringarosa (Alfred Molina), from the ultraconservative Opus Dei branch of Catholicism, and Silas, an albino-monk assassin (Paul Bettany).
The plot is driven not by its characters but by solutions to puzzles, the breaking of codes, interpreting covert references in works of art and a dazzling display of historical knowledge, all of which works terrifically in the novel but puts the brakes to all screen action. Hanks' character is far too reactive and contemplative for a movie action hero, and the cliched nature of those drifting in and out of his orbit hits home with jolting simplicity.
Screen adapter Akiva Goldsman has definitely punched up Brown's third act. He has actually improved on the novel -- at least for those who buy in to the historical controversy that Jesus left behind a royal French bloodline -- by giving the story a broader, more fulfilling payoff than the novel. If one doesn't buy into that controversy, then the story becomes just that much more forced and corrupt. (The final revelation produced a few titters in the first press audience to see the film.)
Howard and Goldsman can't do much, though, with mostly colorless characters designed around idiosyncrasies and weird scholarly talents -- sort of academic X-Men -- rather than flesh-and-blood personalities. No chemistry exists between the hero and heroine, and motivation remains a troubling sore point. Why does the innocent professor flee? Why is Sophie so eager to help? Why is anyone doing what he does when so many characters and subplots turn into red herrings?
One questionable "cinematic" addition to the film are flashbacks to ancient biblical and medieval historical tableaus in the Holy Land and Europe that illustrate Prof. Langdon's continuous lectures on religious history. These look as if some prankster spliced scenes from last year's "Kingdom of Heaven" into the film as a bad joke.
Howard proves a smart choice as a director because his middlebrow tastes inspire him to go for broad strokes and forget making any real sense of these logic-busters. But why did he allow such a solid, attractive cast to turn in such stiff, unappealing performances? Salvatore Totino's glistening cinematography, Allan Cameron's assured production design and Hans Zimmer's driving score are definitely pluses. Yet "Da Vinci" never rises to the level of a guilty pleasure. Too much guilt. Not enough pleasure.
THE DA VINCI CODE
Columbia Pictures
Imagine Entertainment
Credits: Director: Ron Howard; Screenwriter: Akiva Goldsman; Based on the novel by: Dan Brown; Producers: Brian Grazer, John Calley; Executive producers: Todd Hallowell, Dan Brown; Director of photography: Salvatore Totino; Production designer: Allan Cameron; Music: Hans Zimmer; Costumes: Daniel Orlandi; Editors: Dan Hanley, Mike Hill. Cast: Robert Langdon: Tom Hanks; Sophie Neveu: Audrey Tautou; Sir Leigh Teabing: Ian McKellen; Captain Fache: Jean Reno; Silas: Paul Bettany; Bishop Aringarosa: Alfred Molina; Vernet: Jurgen Prochnow; Remy Jean: Jean-Yves Berteloot.
MPAA rating PG-13, running time 147 minutes.
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