The Da Vinci Code

The Da Vinci Code: Good God where to begin; Having read Dan Brown’s novel like most everyone else, I have been eagerly awaiting this film. After reading the book your 1st assumption is – that would make a great movie. After thinking about it more, it is a difficult movie to make since most the “action” and “great discovery” are done with the characters talking and looking at paintings. – Not the most exciting visual, but works magnificently in the book. That being said….The Da Vinci Code is an excellent adaptation of the book. Director Ron Howard did a brilliant job with putting in visuals to help tell the story and have it make sense to those who did not read the book. We have flash backs to the days of Christ – which help make the plot feel that much more real or possible. The key moment, when we observe Da Vinci’s painting of The Last Supper was done superbly. Howard used enough time and changed things a little from the book to make it that much easier to highlight and understand. Tom Hanks plays Robert Langdon – We can all agree he is not the best choice for Langdon. However we are talking about Tom Hanks….he was not going to mess up the part – he did the best he could for not fitting into the Langdon character. Audrey Tautou did a fine job as Sophie Neveu, but the 2 that stole the show were Ian Mckellen as Teabing and Paul Bettany as Silas. Also enhancing the story was the score laid down my Hans Zimmer – I thought the music fit the movie so well….gave you the feeling of great discovery. As they say: the book is almost always better than the movie and that holds true for this adaptation, but that does not mean the movie did not succeed, because it did. The Da Vinci code is so much better than your typical summer fare at the theater. This is an easy film to recommend.
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If this movie had parents they would be: Raiders of the lost Ark & National Treasure

With a running time of 142 minutes
This film is rated PG-13