An excellent movie experience!

Rating: 9/10 (14 May 2009)

Diane and I finished an unusual day today by seeing the second of two movies on alternate days, something that does not happen often. Yesterday was Baader Meinhof and today Angels and Demons: two movies at opposite ends of the viewing spectrum; movies nonetheless that were both hugely satisfying for very different reasons.
Angels and Demons was, as Diane was at pains to tell me, a film not to be taken seriously: character development was at a minimum, like popular novels it was plot driven, action supersede history in many instances and the actors actions sometimes don't fit the plot. However, having said these negatives, I found the movie to be about as good an action film as one will find: very fast paced, beautifully filmed (taking optimum advantage of Rome's beauty) and complexity melding into story very satisfactorily.
I thought Howard's direction was excellent. As with The Code, he managed to handle big scenes, a big script, many characters and many locations extremely well. I thought his shot selection as well as the cinematographer's camera work meshed together to give the film a hugely satisfying breadth. I am a fan of Tom Hanks and I thought he carried his character's role very well. He seemed like a college professor to me and he made the transition from researcher to investigator believably through the entire film. Our only trouble with the action was the fact that driving as quickly as the story demanded through Roman traffic took a fair bit of digesting but, hey, this is a movie not a documentary.
It is a truism that Hollywood morphs itself into what they believe to be the zeitgeist of the particular political times at hand; Hollywood in the eight years of Bush conservatism produced many, many hugely ridiculous films and this, made during but released after, is one of only a few exceptions. The worse thing about attending commercial Cineplex's is sitting through the mind numbing previews; maybe that is why I enjoyed this film as much as I did. I don't think so though; it is an excellent film, one easily worth an afternoon or evening.