Da Vinci Decoded

Hey everyone! So opening weekend, Thomas, Jen and I went to see Da Vinci Code. I was all stirred up as usual about this thinking I'd have to deal with long lines and front row seats. Instead we arrived to no lines and a theatre that was about 2/3 full. And we had excellent seats. An absolute necessity for any movie over 2 hrs. I had dramatically lowered my expectations for DC thanks to 1) The casting, 2) Tom Hanks's hair and 3) the whopping 17 it scored on the Tomameter. Lowered expectations are always a good thing. Because as it turned out the movie was not, in fact, horrible. It was a good movie and I was never bored. The Never Bored test is the one that MUST be passed if I'm to like a movie. But don't get me wrong. I didn't love this movie. It turned out that the casting was a problem, tho surprisingly Tom Hanks's hair didn't end up bothering me too much. I did read the book a few years ago and it was quite the page turner, but I'd forgotten about 4/5 of the plot. This proved to be very helpful as I had no clue where the movie was going and I did get caught up in it all. I had trouble with some of Ron Howard's directing choices - too many ghostlike figures wandering about and too many bizarre closeups. Weird choices between that and the casting. Oh, did I mention the casting? Tom Hanks was so not who I imagined when reading about Robert Langdon. Jen had some good substitutes - Viggo Mortensen and Aaron Eckhart are two that I can recall. And I think Aaron Eckhart would have been absolutely perfect. And tho I absolutely adored Audrey Tautou as Amelie, I didn't dig her as Sophie (this is probably due in part to my antipathy for her Amelie follow-up, A Very Long Engagement (aka, A Very Long Very Boring Movie). I would have infinitely preferred French actress Julie Delpy as Sophie. She and A Eckhart would have had fab chemistry and I can guarantee the movie would have ended with a passionate kiss. Instead at the end, I prayed that Tom would not go there with Audrey. Hyena-like laughter combined with nausea would have been the only possible response. Luckily Howard must have sensed this as well. Aside from Tom and Audrey, the cast was filled with all the stock French actors. Need a French detective? Who else to play him than Jean Reno! He is the go-to guy for French detectives. But the story is good, the pacing is fine and the locations are great. So DC's worth the trip to ye ole cineplex afterall.

Boulder Bumpersticker of the Day: Save the earth so we have some place to boogie.

-sunday