Dir: Ron Howard

Starring: Tom Hanks, Audrey Tautou, Sir Ian McKellen, Paul Bettany, Alfred Molina

The Cannes Film Festival is undoubtedly a marked date on any film calendar. It is a festival which decides the fate of many upcoming movies. Richard  Kelly’s Southland Tales bombed, Ken Loach was honoured and Ron Howard entered The Da Vinci Code to a distinctly mediocre reaction. Some critics praised the film for ‘adapting the unadaptable’ while others claimed a book that was ‘made for the movies’ translated to the screen poorly. These two contradictory opinions exemplify the views of the Cannes critics. So, did the movie live up to the hype created by the marketing campaign and the preceding worldwide bestseller?

Despite the views of some, Tom Hanks did not play the role of Robert Langdon poorly, in fact he was quite the opposite. This was not a Hanks star vehicle and subsequently the character was not the usual emotional male protagonist that is normally apparent in his films. Hanks adapts to this style well, but I think his part has been perceived as bland because the type of role he is playing brings with it an air of unfamiliarity.

The casting on the whole was infallible.

Tautou, Renaux and Molina each put in solid performances but they all, even Hanks, play a supporting role to the two British stars of the film – Paul Bettany and Sir Ian McKellen.

Bettany is outstanding. He is at his best at this role and unnervingly plays the role of Silas with frightening ease. McKellen, as ever, is simply masterful. He is the star of the film and I don’t think anybody would argue that he is one of the best at what he does.

The cinematography, at times, was breathtaking. The camera shots of The Louvre pyramids were fantastic and a wonder to watch. Howard’s direction was questionable at times but on the whole was passable.

There is currently no-one better at creating edge-of-your-seat musical scores than Hans Zimmer. His work here is no exception. It is a tension creating selection and the perfect soundtrack to the film.

Clearly, there will be two types of people who watch this film – those who have read the book and those who haven’t. I think the film has been perceived somewhat negatively because people who have read the novel already envisioned their own film in their heads and this doesn’t match up to it.

The way I see it, any book adaptation is never going to please everyone, especially one with the resounding success of Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code. There is not enough time to put every word written by the author onto the screen, but this was pretty damn close.

While The Da Vinci Code is not the masterpiece some had hoped it to be, it is still a very watchable, very good movie. Don’t be deterred. Believe the hype.

Discuss this movie now at the Pure Movies Forum!