Despite changes it is one of the better book adaptations

Rating: 7/10 (16 May 2009)

I just came out of the movie. I didn't like movie adaptation of "Da Vinci Code". The book was fine , original material was there but the script and movie itself was too slow paced and full of long artificial explanations and dubious conversation scenes. Angels and Demons however had much more movie material to work with...From historical and beautiful Rome locations and replica of Vatican scenery to simpler explanations about Illumunati and their history with Catholic church the whole background was almost with novel. The thing that worked in both book and script of A&D was "ticking time bomb" fact. It both keeps the pace faster and puts a sense of purpose to whole movie. Langdon and Vittoria who try to save cardinals and find the antimatter , Richter , Camerlengo , Strauss , Olivetti who try to control the situation before deadline , Assassin who kills cardinals one by one. There is not much scene to waste because time of the whole movie is also limited and there is lots of material which can or could be adapted....
That is also my major complaint about whole movie. Because of time constraints there are lots of changes like editing the kidnappings of cardinals , origins of relations between Camerlengo and Pope or fight between Langdon , Vittoria and Assassin in Castle of Angels....This is an undeniable problem with book to movie adaptations I guess. Still it is a good movie and a much better adaptation than Da Vinci Code. For Robert Langdon fans we can even see his famous Mickey Mouse wrist watch briefly...