Director: Ron Howard (The Da Vinci Code, Frost/Nixon)Cast: Tom Hanks (Forrest Gump, Cast Away), Ewan McGregor (Star Wars, Big Fish), Ayelet Zurer (Vantage Point, Munich), Stellan Skarsgard (Pirates of the Caribbean, Ronin), Pierfrancesco Favino (The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian), Nikolaj Lie Kaas
The Deal: The Pope has died, and before the conclave can begin to elect the successor, the four preferitti (the primary hopefuls) are kidnapped. Mean while, a specimen of antimatter from the Large Hadron Collider has been stolen from CERN. With it believed that the Illuminati are turning the sinister wheels, Robert Langdon (Hanks) is called on to bring his cryptology skills to Vatican City in hopes of aiding the Vatican police in saving the preferitti and capturing the villainous mastermind.
Thoughts: As books, The Da Vinci Code and Angels & Demons are exceptional pieces of work that are complex, mysterious, and entertaining. The Da Vinci Code film was successful, but it was fairly lackluster in its attempt to do the book justice. Personally, Angels & Demons was the best of the two books, and though the film was far from perfect, I find it to be the better film as well. Condensing the book into a film rushes much of the mystery and complexity, causing all too convenient and quick solutions. That's not to say it's not entertaining, but those two things are what carry the book, but in the film they are dampened for a wider audience and faster pacing.
The performances in the film are passable. Tom Hanks is generally a wonderful actor, but I'm not impressed with him as Robert Langdon, in this and in The Da Vinci Code. His performances are decent, but he is capable of much more, and should be doing more with his talents in this role. Ewan McGregor is decent as well, and I think his performance is less surprising. I consider him a solid actor, and though he's done better than this in the past, this isn't a terribly disappointing role for him. The actor who stood out the most to me was Stellan Skarsgard. Playing the head of the Vatican's Swiss Guard, I thought he did a good job creating a somewhat unpredictable character. The audience can never quite be sure if he will be the bad guy or the good guy, and it's nice having that animosity in a film built on mystery.
As I said before, the film was entertaining. The clash between science and religion is lightly treaded upon, but quite interesting. The use of antimatter is almost science fiction, as the LHC is still being tinkered with, having yet to produce real life antimatter. I like that the Illuminati are portrayed as the bad guys for believing in science, but that some of the church members believe that science and religion can coexist. Plus, having the Illuminati present means seeing some all too cool ambigrams (words that read the same if you were to turn or flip them over) for fire, earth, air, water, and the Illuminati themselves.
Verdict: A fast-paced mystery that at times moves too fast for its own good. The performances are decent, and the story is interesting and entertaining. ☆☆☆1/2
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