Could have been better, Could have been worse

Rating: 5/10 (20 May 2006)

The movie did a decent job at following Dan Brown's original story line and managed to touch on all the key plot points. I feel the casting was great. I think what the film lacked was proper direction. Tom Hanks character seemed a little dry. When reading the novel I got the impression that Robert Langdon was very excited to be a part of history, solving the worlds greatest mystery and who wouldn't be? However, in the film version Tom Hanks didn't manage to pull of much excitement. The overall emotion of the novel got lost in translation to film somewhere and thats why I blame Ron Howard. I think it was just a clean cut case of poor direction. The movie seemed to drag. Unlike the page turning story telling of Dan Brown.
The Da Vinci Code is not a character driven story by any means. Its based on actual historical facts but spun into a fantastical story line. The perfect ingredients for a summer block buster. With that being said the fact that 'The Da Vinci Code' is basically a story comprised of multiple history lessons it would be expected that the original story would be "hollywooded" to death. Fortunatly, the comic relief came in small doses and the pace of the movie seemed to make them far and few. However, when the did try to spring a joke it was a terrible terrible punchline.
Before I start going in circles let me just say this. If you were a fan of the novel the movie will let you down a little bit. I enjoyed the film just not as much as the book. Like I said before it was clearly just bad directing. Too many "washed out" fade to white flashbacks for character development and history. I think at least 9 or 10 of those were used. I would not blame Tom Hanks or Audrey Tatou for the disappointment this movie will bring to the fans of the novel. I would place it all on the guy that gave the go ahead for Ron Howard to direct this. I clearly feel he controlled the mood of this movie 100% and he managed to ruin the pace of the story, and eliminate virtually any kind of emotion for the audience.
**shakes fist and boo's Ron Howard***