DumbVinci Code: The Movie

Since I’m not into boycotting movies and crap like that, I decided to go to DVC last night with my lovely wife. Really, really great film. Incredible dialogue, like the following:”Sophie, you are the last living descendent of Jesus Christ.”

or

Langon: “Sophie, did the argument you had with your grandfather have anything to do with your past?”
Sophie (shocked): “How did you know?”

What the…?

Seriously, the movie was utterly baffling. It was really, really bad. I’m a little bit disappointed, in fact. If it were good, there might just be a likelihood of some amount of dialogue. Instead, as we were walking out I kept hearing words like “boring” and “eh…ok.”

I keep hearing that the movie was faithful to the book. If by faithful to the book you mean, “The book was really bad, and so was the movie,” sure, it was faithful. The changes made to it, though subtle, were a bit interesting. The promoters of the movie have been pushing the idea of dialogue in order to get Christians to go see it. In a fascinating twist, Langdon’s character was turned from being entirely convinced of all the theories about the Priory and the early history of Christianity to the skeptic about Teabing’s theories, actually arguing with him during his little middle of the night lecture. In the end, Langdon turns out to be a mushy, “It only matters what you believe” kind of silliness that I guess is meant to be the final word on the debate.

But there is no debate to be had. To say there will be reasonable and helpful dialogue and debate over DVC is like writing a book that claims that the Buddha was really a staunch proponent of cross-dressing and modern drag and trying to have serious “debate” about that.

A poorly written, directed, and acted movie based on a poorly written book. Seeing McKellen as Teabing spouting those nonsensical lines almost makes me not want to see X3 this coming weekend.

Almost.

iMonk has written on how the Mystery Science Theater 3000 guys could have improved this film.

Amy Wellborn has my favorite line of review yet:

WHERE IS MARY MAGDALENE’S TOMB? WE’VE GOT TO RACE AROUND EUROPE, KILL PEOPLE, RACK OUR BRAINS TO FIGURE OUT STUPID PUZZLES, STAND AROUND IN RESTROOMS AND VILLAS TALKING FOR HOURS AND HOURS AND HOURS ABOUT WHERE IN THE WORLD MARY MAGDALENE’S RELICS ARE. WHY HAS THE CHURCH HIDDEN THEM? WHY DON’T THEY WANT US TO REVERENCE HER? WHERE IN THE WORLD IS THE SUPER-SECRET SPOT WHERE PILGRIMS CAN FLOCK TO HONOR HER?

Er…never mind.