Not sure if this has been posted, but just took a look at the official trailer.
http://www.apple.com/trailers/sony_pictures/da_vinci_code/
Looks like it could be interesting, but I have to admit that while the book was easy to digest, it felt a little shallow. Hopefully the movie will provide me with a good reason to digest some popcorn.
The book was a crock of shit. Almost everything the author claims to be “true” isn’t. See the thorough debunking by Skeptic magazine.
I’ve never read the book, but I have read another book by the author and it was a crock of shit (the actual writing style, not necessarily the story). That being said, is this the kind of book that will make a much better movie than book, since he seems to basically write screenplays, a la John Grisham and Michael Crichton?
I was surprised at how juvenile the book’s writing style was… very simple sentence structures, and relentlessly didactic, like it was aimed at a junior high school audience. Also, his gigantic conspiracy theory wasn’t very convincing, plausible, or interesting, IMHO. I’m a big fan of history and history-oriented fiction, but the book was a big disappointment.
Everything I’ve heard about the book makes it sound like Umberto Eco’s Foucault’s Pendulum’s retarded inbred cousin-brother, sort of interested in the same thing but taking itself far too seriously. Which makes it sound like prime material for any sort of conspiracy-thriller movie, actually.
I’ve never heard of Dan Brown claiming much of anything in the book is “true.” It’s a work of fiction! It’s Harry Potter for grown ups, is all.
Even as far as thrillers-you-take-with-you-to-the-beach go, it was pretty weak.
Man, it couldn’t have been as weak as “Rule of Four” which I actually found in my brother’s beach house. Now THAT was a bad book!
Midnight Son- The concept of “fiction” a bit too complex?
hido- Grisham writes books that turn into movies neatly, but Crichton really doesn’t. Jurassic Park, for example, was a huge mess of plotlines that involved freaking dinosaurs. In 1992, that didn’t sound easily filmable from a technical standpoint, and they had to make massive changes to the book’s plot. The last Crichton book I read was about intrigue in the airline industry, which is also unfilmably dull.
And the worst “airplane trip” books are by Clive Cussler. If we invented transporters sales of that shit would drop to nil.
It’s a bit annoying that a biggest reason that the book got big (the Christian mystery angle) was bitten off of the book Holy Book, Holy Grail though :|
Nitpick! I believe it’s “Holy Blood, Holy Grail.”
Whoops! That was a typo on my part. Sorry about that.
Which is fine and all. Nothing against Dan Brown per se, you know. Man knew a great marketing scheme when it hit him.
Worse yet are those claming Da Vinci Code was a good book, place it as high literature, and convince others of his erudite nature when Foucault’s pendulum sits in its obscure section of hard to read, but really rewarding books. Those are the people that should be forced to watch endless episodes of teletubbies and then asked to write thesis about the post-modernity of lala’s purse.
The thing about it that sticks in people’s craws (both skeptics and Catholics) is that the book is prefaced with a note that claims all the descriptions and such of the artwork and architecture in the book is completely true. Which it isn’t most of the time. Brown’s other similar book Angels & Demons has an identical preface note, and it’s almost completely wrong about every piece of artwork it mentions.
I listened to audiobook recordings of both books during various trips to and from San Francisco and Los Angeles. The Da Vinci Code is strikingly juvenile in its writing style and construction, but Angels & Demons reads like an 18 year old’s Livejournal after a trip to Rome with his senior year Italian class. A friend of mine who speaks Italian fluently and read the book claims that of the dozens of Italian phrases used in A&D, not a single one is correct.
It’s Tinky Winky that has the purse.
Anyone notice the highlighting during the credits of the trailor? I haven’t done any investigation, but my first thought is that they’re setting up an internet/puzzle/viral marketing strategy, seeing as it’s paid off well for other properties recently.
The concept of “don’t make bullshit claims” too skeptical for ya?
Yeah, the word “SEEK” in “SEEK THE TRUTH” highlights, and then in the cast list the following letters highlight: T H S E C D E O. Anyone here good at anagrams?
I enjoyed the book in a breezy, lightweight, beach-reading kind of way. You do have to shut off your brain, though – the more I thought about the book after finishing it, the stupider and crappier I considered it.
Why would the vast majority of the audience care if a single Italian phrase was correct? As long as it sounds plausible, who cares?
Not every book has to be literature. I like literature, don’t get me wrong, but it’s not exactly something I want to curl up with and waste a few hours reading in most cases. It requires me to engage my brain more than relax it.