The Da Vinci Code

And now, a quick review:

A perfectly mediocre piece of entertainment, The Da Vinci Code manages to make the book (which I despised for its leaden prose, artificial cliffhangers, and appallingly bad language usage) somewhat more coherent, but at the same time it is so dreadfully dull that the only way I got through the movie without tearing out my hair was to make jokes to my significant other about the name "Bezu Fache" and how Robert Langdon is Batman. Tom Hanks spends the majority of the movie standing around looking befuddled or getting knocked around, until required for exposition delivery. Audrey Tatou looks radiant, as usual, but isn't required to do a whole lot either. Paul Bettany is scary and religious, OOOOHHH!!! (makes scary hand motions) The only person who seems to have any life or verve in the movie is Sir Ian McKellan, and thats because he's Gandalf and fought the MOTHERFUCKING BALROG. The plot, such as it is, moves insanely fast in the first half hour, then slows down to about the speed of glass moving, and actually climaxes about 45 minutes before the movie ends. Actually, I think the movie is still running, and in fact HASN'T ended and will never end, and in some bizarre application of the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, will continue as long as it is not directly observed not running.

If you shut your brain off, I'm sure the film can be enjoyed immensely, and I'm pretty confident that the movie will make huge amounts of cash for all involved, but its inspired me to write a huge treatise/rant on the dumbing down of pop-culture and the concept of mediocrity as acceptable in all forms of society. I was jokingly told that I am full of so much anger about something so trivial, but the fact is, its not trivial. Pop culture is a reflection of society's mores and values, and an acceptance of mediocrity and inanity leads to the general decay in intellectual discussion and an adherence to a policy of apathy in all affairs. Hence, Bush Administration.

Or maybe thats just how I see it.

In any event, the movie was, in cinematic metaphors, not "White Chicks" bad, but it was nowhere near "Lord of the Rings" levels of bliss. See it, don't see it, I don't care. Its not the worst movie coming out this summer. (That's Little Man.)