A Visual Cliff's Notes

Rating: 8/10 (22 May 2006)

I took the time to read a sampling of other reviews here, spanning the entire range, before writing mine. While none of them changed my opinion, many reinforced what I had already guessed I would find, which was: (a) Most (not all) of those who pan the movie had not read the book. I can understand this. My wife (read it 3 times so far) and I (read it once) agreed that if you had not read the book you might have a difficult time following or even wanting to follow the movie.
(b) Many of the bad reviews mention long periods of exposition. However, this is not only necessary in order to competently bring the book's plot to screen, but it is also faithful to the book, which contains much lengthy exposition.
(c) Many of the bad reviews - those from people who did read the book - complain about so much being left out or abridged in the movie. People, there is simply no way to cram a complete novel into a 2.5 hour movie. Deal with it.
(d) Other reviews, both good and bad, focus on the controversy or the plausibility of the plot, and certainly the media have gone bonkers over the religious implications and have gone to great lengths to dig up various spokespeople who are more than willing to froth at the mouth in front of a camera over this sacrilege or that blasphemy. Can we all please remember that the book is a work of fiction, does not pretend to be anything other than a work of fiction and, as a work of fiction, is an enjoyable and provocative romp? In case you're wondering, my own perspective here is that of a former clergy member (as is my wife). Ease up, folks.
As to our actual review, we both thought the movie was extremely well done, tremendously faithful to the novel, and we had a difficult time imagining that it could have been done any better while remaining true to its source. Given the time constraints of a movie, pretty much everything you could have expected to be there was there. We could think of three instances where there were noticeable plot alterations and in each instance the alteration served the purpose of condensing plot elements in order to suit the movie time frame. In our view, this is perfectly acceptable.
In our opinion (seemingly supported by many of the reviews here) you won't really appreciate this movie unless you've read the book first. You also won't particularly enjoy it (or the book, for that matter) if you insist that all plot elements must be plausible. My title for this review may seem like a bit of a dig, but it really isn't. About halfway through the movie, my wife remarked that she was a bit perturbed by the fact that, while so much of what she was seeing was what she had imagined in her mind's eye as she read the book, many of the characters had different faces than what she had envisioned. We both quickly realized that this was actually a tremendous compliment to the filmmakers, and was how we both perceived the movie. It was as if Mr. Howard et al had shared our personal visions, from actions to ambiance, and had succeeded in bringing this to the screen. Small quibble, then, that some of the faces didn't quite match our own imaginations.
If you've read the book and can be realistic in your expectations of how a novel can be translated to screen, we highly recommend this film. If you haven't read the book, we highly recommend you do so before you see the film. If you insist on taking any of it seriously, you might as well take a pass on both - and try lightening up a bit.