the da vinci code author movies like the the da vinci code

To be sure, The Da Vinci Code is still a ludicrous story that both benefited from and was weighed down by the sensationalism of its conceit. And judging by the infamous catcalls the movie received at Cannes, which were followed by a tepid critical drubbing in the international press, I wasn’t alone in thinking the movie amounted to a lot of overinflated hoopla.īut a funny thing happened when I sat down to watch it on Netflix the other day, about 15 years after its release: I realized what a big goofy delight the movie could be with the right mindset, and what I as a teenager-and so much of the contemporary film press during its time-missed out on.

One that features Tom Hanks earnestly looking into the camera to declare “I need to get to a library!” as the music swells. And all of that cacophonous noise was over… a pretty middle-of-the-road adventure movie. Protests occurred at theaters throughout the U.S., while other international markets banned it outright.

How could something that high-handed live up to that kind of hype?Īs a splashy Hollywood version of Dan Brown’s most popular potboiler, The Da Vinci Code premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in May and was the subject of countless faux-examinations about early Christianity on the cable news circuit-as well as the object of ire for some modern Christians’ growing need for perpetual outrage. All the while, its rollout suggested it had aspirations to be an awards contender. It was an adaptation of the biggest literary phenomenon of the decade not starring Harry Potter, and it was arriving in cinemas with the kind of media frenzy usually reserved for Star Wars. When Ron Howard’s The Da Vinci Code took the world by storm in 2006, I was far from being a professional critic, but I could still be highly critical of something like this.

The da vinci code author movies like the the da vinci code