Sketchy yet boring summary of the novel

Rating: 3/10 (18 May 2006)

While Dan Brown's novel is finely written mystery thriller based on the well-known genre formulas, the film version is built up from well-worn clichés and uninspired film-making. It is hardly believable this is one of the the most awaited films of the year. The movie doesn't contain a single really remarkable scene and leave the viewer rather dispassionate. The screenwriter Akiva Goldsman didn't find a code how to translate the strenghts of the book into a movie. In fact, those who haven't read the book must remain quite puzzled by the fast and incoherent torso of the plot. On the other hand the weaknesses of the novel are even more towering, especially the habit of both central protagonists to give a short lecture on semiotics or secret history at the most improbable moments, usually on the run. Talented actor Tom Hanks was not able to cope with the role of professor of symbology Robert Langdon properly. While the novel had been trying to celebrate the feminine part of humanity, Audrey Tautou with her role of chic French cryptologist did not break out of the familiar type of rather passive heroine serving as a disciple to the brighter male character. So the hero of the day is Sir Ian McKellen with his much more complex and fulfilling role of the history expert Teabing. The movie looks more like a sketchy yet boring summary of the book with an attitude You know all this from the novel so let's go on" And then there are those horrible flashbacks into the past constructed from the ready-made iconography of the Middle ages or granddad's little girls and designed for those lacking imagination or wondering how four people can hide on the floor of a car within a few seconds. And all that pathos, the pathos. OK, the public will always crave for gaining the power over the monolith of the past. There will always be some popular consoler who will give us a hint that everything we know from the school is wrong and that anyone can find his own holy grail because it have been right in front of our eyes all the time. You don't even have to be an academic to find the hidden truth; reading between the lines in the bestselling novels is sufficient. Spoiler warning: Who cares that instead of the true grail - which has to be principally inner, non-material - the goal of this quest is represented by a charming young lady with noble blood? Mass-market truth is always out there".