There are two main reasons why one would be psyched for the movie Angels and Demons: a Catholic church fetish and a Ewan McGregor fetish. Both are looking very, very good in this movie -- the church with all of her high rituals, secret societies and drama, Mr. McGregor with his well-tailored robes and his earnest, faith-based pleas for compassion and honesty.
Tom Hanks is part Jessica Fletcher, part MacGyver, only with worse hair than either one of them, and if a movie is going to rely so heavily on a character spouting off paragraphs of fun facts about statues being castrated or Illuminati member Galileo, I wish they'd hired someone more appealing in their vocal talents and less nasally to prattle on at us in the audience. Familiarity with the book or the other movie is unnecessary, in fact this movie implies it's a sequel to the Da Vinci Code even though the book is technically a prequel. But does it really matter why the Vatican is mad at Tom Hanks but must turn to him for their only hope? No, like everything else, its all just a plot device.
The movie is very tightly wound and every single moment fits perfectly into the frenetically paced plot -- these people do more in one hour than Jack Bauer in an episode of 24, and if you've ever been to Rome and experienced driving there, you know there are more miracles occurring here in the car than in the sanctuaries. The problem is that the movie so well-laid out, you pretty much know everything that is coming. Dan Brown's books are the equivalent of the TV Guide crossword puzzle, where you marvel and snark at how easy they are, while completing them in their entirety. There is something extremely satisfying about solving the puzzle, especially in the bombastic hand of director Ron Howard and when you need a fluffy summer movie to see with your CSI-loving grandma.
-- A. RAYMOND JOHNSON
Previously > Carlos Cuaron's Rudo y Cursi
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