Works as a Thriller but not as a mystery

Rating: 6/10 (21 May 2006)

Acting was, of course, considering the cast, excellent. It was thrilling and exciting and well photographed. It was fun to watch. Good movie.
As a mystery, it falls apart. And as history it is chock full of false information -- but, it must be remembered that the book and the movie are fiction, not fact. And, I think the majority realize this and I kept that in mind when I watched the movie and enjoyed it.
The characters depicted are supposed to be highly intelligent yet they make tortured intuitive leaps which weren't logical. There are almost too many to list. The obvious ones are 1.) Even if Mary Magdelene was married to Jesus, how does that make her divine and how does that affect Christ's divinity? Mary's divine and Jesus isn't? If Jesus was married, so what? 2.) The "Sang Real" is a huge, gigantic secret, yet at every turn in the movie it seems that everyone in the film knows about it. Ever try to keep a secret with just one or two people? Why wasn't this 'secret' widely known after centuries of so many people knowing it. And going around killing off the bloodline doesn't wash. 3.) The protectors of the "Sang Real" (Priory of Sion or whatever) show up at the end to "Protect Sophie . . . 'as we always have'". So, where in the heck were they throughout the movie? 4.) So what if Leonardo Da Vinci painted a picture with a woman in it or left a chalice out? It's not relevant. He wasn't at the last supper. How does that support a conclusion that Jesus was married? It doesn't. How could highly-intelligent people make these illogical conclusions? Historically, the council of Nicea did NOT meet to throw away gospels. They met to decide whether to enter 2 Peter and some other new Testament books into canon that had already been widely accepted by the first church. The gospel mentioned in "The Da Vinci Code" was written a few hundred years after Christ's resurrection whereas the canonical gospels were written within a generation of Christ, from eye-witness accounts, and were already widely accepted by the first Church.
The council of Nicea met to debate only one huge question -- Christ's divinity. 1. Was Christ pre-eminently divine and therefore the Son of God and God Himself OR 2. Was Christ appointed by God to be His son after His resurrection. The vote at Nicea was decidedly one-sided -- only two votes out of approximately 300 were cast for the second premise. It was by a landslide vote that the council adopted the biblical view that Christ was pre-eminent, that Jesus Christ was not a created being but the son of God and finally that Christ was God incarnate.
Good movie, bad history. Conclusion: A fine thriller that doesn't pass the smell test for logic yet enjoyable to watch.