It seems like everywhere I turn, I am hearing people squeal about how the Da Vinci Code is anti-Christian and more evidence of Hollywood’s anti-Christian bias. Enter Michael Medved, Christianity’s biggest Jewish supporter:
MEDVED: I do, but the buzz has turned very decisively negative. When you see that there are people in India who are talking about fasting to the death to protest the film.
When the Gallup poll shows that 48 percent of Americans say they will definitely not see “The Da Vinci Code”, that‘s not a good sign for a box office blockbuster.
One of the things you see with this movie, Tucker, as I have been writing about this for 20 years literally, that Hollywood keeps attacking religion again and again and again. Films that have anti-religious themes and particularly anti-Catholic themes and they never make a dime. They tend to do very, very badly at the box office.
Now this film has a guaranteed box office return because of the tremendous success of the novel. But the idea that, by refusing to soften some of the anti-Christian, some of the—what people would consider to be heretical themes in the movie, that they could have, by softening it, I think ensured a much greater financial indication.
I don’t have any links to offer, but I am pretty sure ‘Hollywood’ didn’t commission Dan Brown to write the Code. In fact, I am willing to bet he never expected to sell 40 million copies, and I am reasonably sure Hollywood is only ‘attacking Christians’ with this movie BECAUSE the book sold 40 million copies.
I have no problem with critics panning this movie, but the sheer idiocy of the professionally aggrieved religious right is, as always, a bit too much to swallow. I will say this one last time- the Da Vinci Code is fiction. Much like creationism, for that matter. If I hear any more whinging on this subject, I am going to begin to think the Romans had the right idea.
John S.
I wonder, John, what precisely makes the theory of creationism a work of fiction?
I call it as such, because I find it to be more of an assumption based on limited information or knowledge rather than a lie or some figment of the imagination that is not based on facts in evidence.
Andrew
More to the point, the Da Vinci Code is one of the shittiest, half-assed pieces of crap writing that I have ever suffered through. It is simply bad in every way.
Even Angels & Demons, Dan Brown’s previous book, was a decently mediocre thriller. Da Vinci Code is just bad by comparison.
lard lad
I still recall the Xian protestors who showed up en masse to protest Monty Python’s Life of Brian when it opened in Alabama about 25 years ago. One particularly venomous picketer gleefully informed me and my chums that we would be riding the first coal car to hell as divine payment for our patronage. Of course, that only fired us up to see the movie all the more. Good times…
Hey, has Scrutator weighed in on The Da Vinci Code yet? I could use a good horselaugh.
MN Politics Guru
I’m not going to see the movie because I couldn’t care less about it. Why do people see the book and movie as being interesting? More importantly, why do people take it so seriously they are willing to protest over it?
srv
Wow, has it been that long? Little did we know that it would be the Ground Zero of Christo-Fascism.
Damn the British.
lard lad
Hear, hear.
Funny thing is, the most interesting part of the book was the religious and cultural arcana (even though it was all complete bullshit), while the plot itself was potboiler trash. Doesn’t seem like a formula for a watchable film — though one could just gaze longingly at Audrey Tautou throughout, I suppose…
W.B. Reeves
Yes John, it’s fiction. Fiction based on fact, however. I’m not refering to the to the plot devices in Brown’s book (the divine bloodline, Knights Templar, etc.) but to the supressed scriptures of the early Christian movement. That’s what has the various religious heirarchs in a twist.
The recovery of the so-called “Gnostic Gospels”, nearly two millenia after their suppression by the Council of Nicea in tandem with Imperial Rome, opened a window into the world of the early Church that the Bishops and their successors had thought sealed shut. Unsurprisingly, this window revealed a reality at wide variance from official history and doctrine. We now know that early Christianity was an extremely heterodox and diverse spiritual movement. That it embraced spiritual conceptions that directly challenge the controling dogmas of the past 2000 years.
Their existence constitutes a direct challenge to all existing religious authority whether Catholic, Orthodox or Protestant.
This is what all the shouting is really about. Not the “Da Vinci Code” itself but the recovered history that inevitably leads to questioning the legitimacy of ruling orthodoxy.
El Hijo
What’s the big deal if Jesus had a family with kids? Isn’t it the message of spirituality that is important in religion – not who or what the messenger is?
Personally, I enjoyed the book and look forward to the movie. I’ve even created a fake tale of Jesus on my blog if you care to read it!
Vlad
What does it say about Catholicism that The Powers That Be are so deeply threatened by a frothy little paperback thriller? If someone’s faith is so fragile that Dan Brown could shatter it, the church has larger issues than The DaVinci Code…
jcricket
Medved is one of the worst bloviators on talk radio. He went off the deep end when declaring he “hate, hate, hated Million Dollar Baby”. He simply can’t abide by a a nuanced portrayal of euthenasia. Clearly any work of fiction displaying the idea that one might want to die rather than live as a legless quadrapalegic hooked up to tubes for sustenance is clearly beyond the pale and a clear example of our nation’s moral bankruptcy.
W.B. Reeves
What does it say about Medved’s social conservative creds that his great, career making accomplishment was elevating the life and work of a grade z, transvestite movie director to the status of cultural icon?
Pooh
Exactly…
And the stupid thing is, all the “outrage” has built up a guaranteed audience for the film even though it Might Just Suck as a movie – the same thing happened with Brokeback, which I’m guessing did far better business than it otherwise might have because of all the free pub from the proffessionally outraged.
Caleb
The book was crap, so it’s no suprise the movie isn’t exactly Schindler’s List.
But, as stated above, the novel has no bearing on the truth it “revealed”, if you will, to over 40 million folks, who, 99% had never heard of the agnostic Gospels before this.
___________________________
“What’s the big deal if Jesus had a family with kids? ”
If you have to ask…….
RandyH
I really loved the book. I literally couldn’t put it down or get to sleep when reading it. I agree with the reader above who said that Angels and Demons was good (my sisters liked Angels and Demons better,) but I really thought the DaVinci Code was a better story. Not sure why, but it got my logical brain functions going while keeping me enthralled with the fast-moving story. Dan Brown writes his books like screenplays (short chapters – each detailing an individual scene,) so it should have been an easy conversion. I am anxious to see the movie. I only hope that they didn’t tone it down for the religious folks, because many of them aren’t gonna watch it anyway – they’ll just say rotten things about it without seeing it.
Of course it’s fiction. So is much of the bible, really. It’s absurd to expect for all entertainment be sanitized so that religious viewers’ heads don’t explode or (god forbid) actually question their faith.
Pooh
I mean, on some level I get it (it’s the mortal/divine thing,) but that’s on the level of ‘the mythology’ rather than the application to one’s life.
Andrew
I believe I said “decently mediocre”; it was in no sense “good.”
Sirkowski
I hope it’s a good sign that storytellers are starting to modify and interpret the “mythology” that is the Bible. Nobody’s complaining about film versions of Hercules, Jason and the Argonauts or Troy. It’s all stories.
ThomasD
“But, as stated above, the novel has no bearing on the truth it “revealed”, if you will, to over 40 million folks, who, 99% had never heard of the agnostic Gospels before this.”
Well, count me as one who, heretofore, had never heard of any agnostic Gospels. Are they anything like jumbo shrimp?
Funny.
terry chay
Unfortunately “an assumption based on limited information or knowledge” is not what a theory is. Or, if it is a theory, it is one long since disproven.
Personally, I prefer to think of it as a parable, but I’ve been told by the press that I’m in the minority among religious adherents.
I won’t comment on Da Vinci Code except to say that 20 million copies truly boggles the mind, and to sheepishly confess that I am one of them).
Steve
I hate to disagree with my good friend Pooh, but I think the guaranteed audience for the film is primarily due to the fact that about a trillion people have read the book.
I’m not particularly interested in seeing the movie, but my wife is, so I guess that makes me part of the guaranteed audience too. Sigh.
Paul Wartenberg
Didn’t Michael Medved once trash “King of Kings”? Well, he had a good reason: it was boring as Hell.
I have a very legitimate reason to not watch the Code, much in the same way I haven’t read much of the book: IT’S BAD. IT JUST SUCKS. There’s pulp ficiton, and then there’s BAD FICTION OY!
(naturally being a lousy author meself I’m not one to complain, but again it takes one to know one…)
Paul Wartenberg
That wasn’t his intent. His intent was to mock and humiliate the guy (and it didn’t hurt the Mighty Medv that Ed Wood had died just before he did his Golden Turkey Awards junk to do so). It was something else, a cult movie about cult movies called “It Came From Hollywood” that ‘improved’ Wood’s reputation.
Pooh
And they are now all very much aware that it is a Big Huge Movie opening Soon! If I still played HSX, I think this film would be a pretty classic short starting on Monday, from the early word of mouth, I can’t see it having huge legs, but we’ll see tommorow.
Slide.
Yawn
tBone
Hear, hear. Haven’t read the DaVinci Code, but I did read Digital Fortress. After finishing that steaming pile of dung, I would rather be locked in a room for a year with Martha Stewart, Kathie Lee Gifford and Carrot Top than read another Dan Brown novel. And I say that as someone who has a wide-ranging knowledge of, and appreciation for, escapist trash. That book was horrible.
What’s worse is that I’m the kind of person who has to finish a book or a movie once I start it, no matter how excrutiatingly bad it may be. I still have nightmares about the film version of “Congo.”
The Other Steve
Dan Brown is a crap writer. The story is, however, entertaining. The critics at Cannes panned it, but then they’ve always hated popular movies.
I don’t know why these guys are getting so up in arms over it. Brown stole most of his story from the Holy Blood, Holy Grail examination of what basically turned out to be a sham… the Priory of Sion.
But they did write a creative book, and intertwined within the conspiracy theory are many wonderful pieces of religious fact dealing with the Deadsea scrolls and other religious scholarship.
I expect Da Vinci Code to be a fairly big hit this summer, most likely bust $80 million or so in the opening weekend, and gross $300 million or so. Which is good, because this will bring money into the producer who can then make a bunch of crap movies that people at Cannes will like next year.
Eural
Wow – this must be the blog for literature critics today. Hey, I’ve read DV’s Code and “Deception Point” by Mr. Brown and found them very similiar to most of Crichton’s stuff – fast-paced, fun, semi-to-very intelligent reads that are hoot for a week or so. Why all the anger? Jealous much or did I miss all the mega-best sellers you guys have written lately? The movie might just suck but so far none of you has seen it so how do you know? The movie also might be a fun summer thriller but so far I haven’t seen it so how would I know?
If it’s not your cup of tea don’t drink it.
Zifnab
Oh, it’s not that bad. I’ve read the book and it scored slightly below some of Criton’s shitter Sci-Fi novels, but the riddles at least were entertaining and the twists at the end was not entirely unbelievable or anticipated.
That said, *POSSIBLE SPOILER* I fail to see, again and again, what people actually find so offensive about the book. Brown softballed everything. The evil Albino and his Opus Dei patron were merely misguided, the former a victim of circumstance and the latter simply a man of the cloth fighting for his convictions. The Vatican itself keeps its hands clean. And the evil mastermind behind the whole story is about as far from a religious figure as the book possesses. *SPOILER OVER*
So I don’t see what the big freak’n deal is. If this had been a story about Pharoahs or Buddists or Aborigones, we’d all note it was a work of fiction and not fly off the deep end with the revelation that the Egyptian religion was all one big lie. Why does the ‘Christian’ backdrop suddenly make the story so taboo?
srv
If they don’t have to see a Micheal Moore movie to comment about it, why this one?
tBone
If someone serves me a shit sandwich, do I have to be a gourmet chef to criticize it?
The Other Steve
Christianity is a dying religion. Sad to say, but it’s on the decline in the United States and most of the world. So they’ve lost faith. They now think they need to rely upon gimmicks and tricks to attract people(witness sing-along sunday sermon, promise keepers, and all the other modern day clap trap), all of which do more to push peoplea way in the long run.
But the point is, they’ve lost faith and they are highly defensive about it.
canuckistani
I read Holy Blood, Holy Grail, and it all seemed pretty bogus to me. But if it’s true, or even close to true, then that Biblical Inerrancy stuff goes through the shredder, so I can see why the hard core Fundies are threatened.
I’d see it to piss off the religious right, but it doesn’t sound all that good, so I think I’ll rerent Life of Brian again.
The Other Steve
How many shit sandwiches have you made?
How many have you eaten?
Those are the real questions.
The Other Steve
Read Bart Ehrman’s “Misquoting Jesus” about the Biblical Inerrancy stuff.
The Priory or Sion crap, and the whole European history piece of HB,HG was bullshit. I did read some of their footnoted works such as the “Passover Plot” by Hugh Schonfeld, which basically makes the case that Christ didn’t die on the Cross but was rather an elaborate plot to make the romans think he did. There’s a persuasive argument in there.
If you follow that argument, though, you come to realize that the miracles of Christ may have simply been PR stunts, to prove that this new religion was as good as, if not better than the existing ones of the time. That is, our God was also born of a virgin, and he can walk on water too as well as raise the dead! All your God can do is throw lightning bolts.
All of that is, however, unimportant. As Thomas Jefferson found, the fundamental aspect of Christianity isn’t the miracles and magic. It’s the teachings.
As Ehrman notes in his book, what makes Judaism and Christianity so fundamentally different in it’s day and age, was that it was a religion which taught you how to live a good life. Other religions of the time were largely only about trying to explain away how the world worked.
tBone
I’d tell you, but I don’t want my wife to start serving me seconds.
tBone
The real question: does he have noodly appendages?
ppGaz
Think of the possibilities, though.
“While it’s not really my thing, this is some really good shit.”
etc
carpeicthus
I’m not sure there’s a better reason to watch any move.
Eural
Now that was funny – I’m going to steal the line if you don’t mind.
Oh, yeah – the answer is yes.
Eural
OK – maybe the movie does suck. I just checked in at CHUD.com and it got slammed (2 out of 10 points!). Rotten Tomatoes also has it at a 17% rating. Ouch.
Smurfette
I second Carpeicthus’s stance.
scs
Again -evidence of anti-Christian bashing. Everyone else can whin(g?)e (nah, skip the ‘g’, we don’t need it): gays can whine, Muslims can whine, Jews can whine, Greens can whine, minorities and women can whine – but Christians can’t whine. Giving people different treatment for the same reasons is called discrimination, and the irony is, is that it usually comes from people who consider themselves “enlightened”. Could be that such people are unwittingingly influenced by the ideas of the “media elite”, many of whom are themselves not Christian, and as a result perhaps have less sympathy and identity for such Christian whining.
Jess
Once again I’m struck by the deep similarities between the identity politics of the academic left and the wails of the constantly outraged religious extremists. The only difference is that the Xians are highly unlikely to ever be dangerously marginalized in this era, while the minority groups championed by the left have been truly oppressed and marginalized, which I guess is something that needs to be factored into the equation at least to a minor degree. Neither side seems willing to extend the same rights they claim for themselves to their opponents. Both sides give me a migraine.
scs
A good observation. But in the end, irrelevant. It shouldn’t matter what position a group holds in a soceity, high or low, all should have the same rights and expectations.
Pb
The IMDB has The Da Vinci Code at 6.2/10, which is roughly average–not great, but not a stinker either. And yes, due to all the hype and the sheer star power and scale involved, it was practically guaranteed to get panned by many critics, no matter how good or bad it actually was.
As for the far-right whackjobs–this is just another example of how they simply can’t distinguish fiction from reality, and instead allow themselves to be distracted by hate and shiny objects. That’s right folks, the scourge of godless gay liberal immigrant albino monk marriage is what is ruining our country, not boring things like governmental and corporate corruption, greed, waste, borrowing, spending, mismanagement, cronyism, and lawlessness.
Jess
Evidence? With 80-85% of the population identifying themselves as Christian, it seems highly unlikely that the media is dominated by non-Christians. Furthermore, the ONLY reason why special whining privileges have been given to minority groups is because their civil rights have been so often trampled upon, which is not the case with Christians in America (outside of a few isolated incidents). Once everyone has equal rights and reasonably equal opportunities, patience for whining will quickly vanish, if it hasn’t already.
Pb
tBone,
You *finished* that? I read a few chapters when I saw it sitting around in a laundromat while I was on vacation, and hated it all. I think I hated the horrible caricatures of characters most, although the jabberwocky posing as computer jargon was a close second.
scs
I don’t beleive that. Everyone should have the right to express themselves, as long as they do it in a responsible way. How else are we going to learn what the other is feeling?
scs
I would like to see a survey on the identity of the top levels of the media.
Jess
I couldn’t agree with you more–the trick is to listen with an open mind to “whining” to suss out whether civil rights really are being undermined. This is important because the only way we will maintain our civil rights and liberties is if we take it personally if any of our fellow Americans are denied them for any reason. It’s not an us-and-them situation–it’s all “us.”
capelza
I’ve been visiting the IMDB board for this film. Man, you’d think that Brown (and Opie, too!) showed Jesus gatting it on with a goat. Crazy, crazy people. Oh yeah, and if you go to see the movie, yes, you’ll burn in hell.
Apparantly the thought of the founder of the family values faith actually having his own family is “vile and disgusting”.
I’m going to go see it just to piss these people off.
Jess
Sounds like we’re on the same page here. I was commenting on the reality of social negotiations, not proposing a diminished level of patience as an ideal. I was attempting to explain why we take some “whining” more seriously than others.
Zifnab
I couldn’t agree more. I just don’t understand why the right to express oneself is denied a Hollywood movie producer or book writer but lavished upon right-wing pundits and demagogues.
The reason this whole “Christians are being persecuted” shtick runs so thin is because we’ve seen “Christians” bashing everything from gay teletubbies to women not in the kitchen to evil stem cell scientists. So when they come off with crocodile tears over how their faith got called a bad name, and how they’re being crucified so very very unfairly, it rings somewhat false.
Jess
I hope that most of the Christian protesters are not arguing for silencing Hollywood–I think they’re just registering their outrage, just as members of the gay community protested “Fatal Attraction.” But I could be wrong–I remember Randall Terry once stating “Our goal is a Christian nation…we are called by God to conquer this country. We don’t want equal time. We want plurality.” It’s this kind of attitude that repells many of us from Christianity.
ppGaz
This is why I know that you are either a stupid troll, or a spoof.
Nobody gives a flying soft squishy shit what you or anyone is “feeling.” We are talking about real issues and playing with live ammunition here. People die because of the stuff we talk about.
It’s what we know and don’t know that counts, not what anyone “feels” about it. Feelings? Nothing more than feelings? Shove them deep up your ass.
Mr Furious
Ouch.
Not from me (I don’t care), but that seems a bit gratuitous…
Jess
ppGaz, that was uncalled for–no one was attacking you or even being uncivil to each other. For once we were having a semi-productive discussion that actually mapped out some common ground. I know you despise scs, but don’t go shitting all over an otherwise reasonable exchange for no good reason. As much as I generally agree with you and enjoy your comments, you really haven’t been doing much to improve the tone around here lately. Should I send you some of my Zoloft?
ppGaz
No, you should go fuck yourself. I was speaking to her-it-him, whatever the fuck scs is, and it’s none of your damned business.
ppGaz
And don’t ever talk to me again about “the tone around here.” Make your own tone, and leave mine alone.
Jess
1) Why are you telling me to go fuck myself for what I said to you? This isn’t a playground, and I’m not your enemy. And you’re not Darrell–are you?
2) If it’s none of my business what you say to scs, then it’s none of your business what s/he says to me. This isn’t your private flame war. What any of us say here affects the kind of discussions we can have, and too many of them have been turned into intensly boring exchanges of insults. Could we PLEASE get past that and move on to something more interesting, not to mention adult?
ppGaz
Good point, and well made.
However, my war with scs is long standing and nothing has changed other than her-its recent absence, which has not lasted long enough for me. In any case, I reiterate that it’s none of your business, nor need what I said have any bearing on your conversation with it-her-him.
I don’t care what you feel, or think about this. I don’t care what you think about the “tone in here.” I don’t care what you think about me wrt to this subject either.
I don’t like scs. I believe it’s a spoofed character. If not spoofed, a very pathological personality and nasty troll. The character is dishonest, smarmy, manipulative, and sneaky. It pretends to be “nice” but is actually vicious and will stop at nothing to fuck you over if it decides to do so, which is almost certain to happen if you get into any heated exchange with it. It advances lunatic views and defends intellectually toxic positions.
It is spoofed, as I believe, then I have to admit, it’s a helluva good job. But spoofs deserve to be treated as spoofs.
As for the “exchanges of insults,” drop dead. Seriously. There is enough evil shit being pawned off around here to sink a battleship, and I will go after it at every opportunity in whatever voice suits me at the moment, and if you don’t like it, too bad.
Sorry, that’s just the way it is.
Steve
Indeed. People have been known to get an aneurysm just from reading it.
ppGaz
Besides, this is a thread about (a) a crummy book, (b) an apparently crummy movie based on the book, and (c) an imaginary “attack on religion” which exists only in the imaginations of a few phony-assed manipulators.
Don’t ask me to take this crap seriously. It’s about as serious as the controversy over Tinky Winky being gay.
scs
I agree. That’s why the only posters on here left are moatly DougJ clones and ppgaz. Many of the former regulars have gone awol. Any one with a little bit a maturity has been driven away by them a long time ago. And who’s to blame for that? John- for letting it go on like that. If you don’t care about the quality of your product, people will find a better product elsewhere.
ppGaz
Are mostly spoofs, including you, you phony creep.
tBone
Like I said, I have this terrible character flaw that will never let me quit on a book or movie, no matter how putrid. I’ve seen “Superman IV: The Quest for Peace.” Twice.
The tech stuff actually got worse as the book went along, if you can believe that. By the end I could actually feel my brain cells dying with each new bullshit-laden sentence.
DougJ
I can’t agree with you here John. At all.
Oh, really. Do you have proof? What about the secret meetings in Prague bewteen Weinstein and Brown?
39 million of those “sales” were bulk orders placed by MoveOn.org, dailykos, and WardChurchill.org. Some “bestseller”, huh?
ppGaz
Hey bone, please send me an email. Take my url, and turn left at the first page. First text you see written by me, that’s where the address is.
thx
The Other Steve
Well, I suppose it’s possible. He was born in a manger after all, and there were animals all around while he was growing up.
After all… “When you grow up on a farm in Georgia, your first girlfriend is a mule.”
Granted, Jesus wasn’t in Georgia.
Andrew
Maybe all of the characters at Balloon Juice are written by Dan Brown. That would explain the depth of the dialogue.
demimondian
Tim…do keep in mind that Demimondian, warts and all, would also have spent a few unpleasant minutes feeding the lions in Rome.
Just sayin’
Andrew J. Lazarus
Jews. All Jews. (That is what you were trying to say, wasn’t it?)
Zifnab
Murdocks not a Jew is he? I can’t remember.
croatoan
How weak is people’s faith that they have to run down a movie they haven’t seen? What are they so afraid of? It reminds me of a line from Dogma (another movie that got the same treatment): “I have issues with anyone who treats faith as a burden instead of a blessing. You people don’t celebrate your faith; you mourn it.”
CaseyL
Da Vinci Code was a mediocre book and its continuing best-selling popularity is a great mystery to me. The only explanation I can think of is that most Americans are profoundly, utterly ignorant of early Christian history, the Goddess traditions that flavored early Christian theology, and the Gnostic Gospel.
So the gimcrack mysticism and pseudo-historical arabesques might be the first time most Americans ever encountered anything other than a King James-derived version of Christianity.
This might not be a bad thing (though even praising DVC that much sticks in my throat) if – and it’s a big if – it leads to people doing their own reading and research into the subject. They’re in for some shocks if they do.
The Other Steve
I think he’s Grand Master of the Masons. Or maybe the Illuminati, can’t be sure.
tBone
I hope you still think that’s funny when you’re fleeing from the Balloon Juice Illuminati, you heretic.
ppGaz
Dan Brown is DougJ.
bago
Ian McKellan made the amusing point that he thought the bible should also come with a warning that it was a peice of fiction.
I suppose though that christians are perfectly right in demanding explicit labeling for works of fiction. If they didn’t need it, well then they wouldn’t be christian, now would they?
Paul Wartenberg
So does this mean all the other books that receive massive bulk orders (those by Coulter, Hannity, Limbaugh, Savage et al.) get the same sarcastic ‘bestseller’ critique from you?
Jim Allen
I’m still trying to figure out how a movie that stars Forrest Gump and was directed by Opie Taylor can bring down the Catholic church.
CaseyL
Paul, there’s something you should know about DougJ…. :)
Brian
I have not read the book, and have no desire to. Same for the movie. Despite all the hype around it, the story has no pull on me. My wife read it and thinks it’s fabulous, but I thumbed through the novel and noticed that it had very short chapters and seemed to be laid out like a script, so it was probably destined for film from the beginning.
I can’t imagine a director like Ron Howard setting out to bash Christianity. Oliver Stone, sure, but not Ron Howard. I actually feel bad for the guy, because he’s a very decent person who, if most of the reviews are true, simply made a bad flick. Happens to the best of them. The real culprit is the screenwriter Akiva Goldsman, who has a spotty record behind the keyboard, at best. He failed to convert the wildly popular book into a suitably entertaining piece of celluloid.
And as for the top levels of the media, the very top levels, thay are a mix of religous backgrounds. Murdoch, since someone asked, is an Aussie with, I believe, a Protestant background (he also has American citizenship). But where the deals are made, where the rubber meets the road, they are primarily Jewish. Murdoch, for instance, has Peter Chernin heading up all of News Corp (aka Fox). Hollywood has always been, and will always be, primarily a Jewish community. But, they’re as willing to be critical of their religion as they are Christianity, so there’s no anti-Christianity motivations among them. They (the media chieftains of all religious backgrounds) bleed green, the color of money. If a film can make money, it’ll get made, and they have whole teams of Marketing and PR flacks to deal with the fallout.
Personally, I think the best movie about Christianity, which was not exactly pro-Christian, is the one that Monty Python made about my life.
Devil's Advocate
The Christian bigots always need some alleged proof or other that they are being victimized. If it’s not the “War on Christmas”, it’s the “Da Vinci” code. What a bunch of whiny wankers!
Devil's Advocate
Religion is the Kool-Aid of the masses…
Earl F. Parrish
When the Gallup poll shows that 48 percent of Americans say they will definitely not see “The Da Vinci Code”, that‘s not a good sign for a box office blockbuster.
If 52% of Americans went to see a movie, that would set an all time box office record. About 10,000,000 adults attend movies at least once per month. It would require about five percent of the 200,000,000 adults to reach that figure.
Paul L.
Sorry, I remember all the whining/criticism about the Passion of the Christ when it was released. So I do not care whose filling are hurt if the Christians whine/criticize Da Vinci Code. Or would John prefer the Christians rioted and killed the producers like the Muslins do.
I remember that the media and universities capitulated pretty fast when the Muslins are offended over the Mohammed cartoons.
nyrev
I read the book. It wasn’t the worst thing I’ve read by a long shot, but it was strictly beach reading. Fluffy, packed full of mildly interesting cardboard cutouts, some mild suspense and a “mystery” that was easily solvable half-way through the book. I wouldn’t pay to see it on the big screen, but might watch it on cable if it’s raining and there’s nothing better to do. As for the protests — please. Gibson’s two-hour snuff film was a greater threat to Christianity than any of Dan Brown’s tripe.
demimondian
Paul L. shows why the Republicans are the natural opposition. Just as the Democrats act like a governing party when we’re out of power, so the Republicans act like an opposing power, even when entrusted with the responsibilities of government. The Democrats propose solutions to problems, and continue to work to refine those solutions, even when they are not the governing party. The Republicans spend their time complaining about the Democrats instead of doing their job of governing.
Let’s make the Rebulicans happy — put them back in the opposition, a role they fit well.
Marcus Wellby
Thank God the Brave White Christian Soldiers are protecting us from bad movies based on bad books, manimals, the Grinch, Spanish speaking landscapers, Will and/or Grace, and the dreaded specter of privacy.
Compared to those evils, it is no wonder Our Lord and Saviour Saint George the Resolute cannot be bothered to hunt down the trivial Osama bin Whatshisname.
The Other Steve
Can’t quite remember the last time a producer was killed by a Muslin in America.
Must happen fairly frequently for Paul to have brought it up.
The Other Steve
Never heard of him.
Steve
You stole that right from the Grover Cleveland playbook, didn’t you?
Devil's Advocate
Paul is one of the whiny wankers.
demimondian
Hey, no fair telling!
Paul L.
Did I say in America?
Holland’s shameful treatment of Ayaan Hirsi Ali.
“She was the ideal choice of collaborator for the Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh (a distant descendant of the anguished painter) on Submission, a film about the ignored problem of enslaved and oppressed women in Holland. Ayaan Hirsi Ali wrote the screenplay and provided the movie’s voice-over.
You probably remember what happened next: Van Gogh was bicycling to work one morning in 2004 in the capital city of one of Europe’s most peaceful and civilized countries when he was shot down in the street and then mutilated in a ritual fashion by an Islamist fanatic. The murderer (who had expected to become a martyr but who was only wounded in the leg by the gentle Dutch cops) left a long “martyr’s letter” pinned to van Gogh’s corpse by an equally long knife. In it, he warned Ayaan Hirsi Ali that she was the next target, and he gave a long and detailed account of all the offenses that would condemn her to an eternity in hell. (I noticed, reading this appalling screed when it was first published, that he obsessively referred to her as “Mrs. Hirshi Ali,” as if trying to make her sound like a Jew. Other references to Jews in the text were even less tasteful.)”
demimondian, how does your response address anything I wrote?
demimondian
What was there in what you wrote which warranted a response? You guys wanted the responsbility of governing — great. Now, take it on. Stop whining about the left, *do your fucking job*.
drindl
Christians are sure a touchy, defensive lot. They doth protest too much, I fear. I had zero interest in the book/movie until they started up, now i have to watch it even if it’s awful, just to see what their problem is. I sure wish they’d shut up once in awhile, though. It’s wearying.
Noodly appendages rule!
Zifnab
Theo Van Gogh, the great grandnephew of Vincent Van Gogh, the famous Dutch painter, was murdered on the streets by a muslim youth who was offended by his latest film “Submission” which criticised the Islamic faith’s treatment of women.
The event was a hallmark of our time, because it reminded so many people of what bad faith can do to society. Thankfully, the American Christian church doesn’t have that type of power or persuasion over its populace today (unless you’re an abortion doctor), but I’m sure if he were alive in America he’d at least have his phones tapped.
SeesThroughIt
Well, you could always wade over to the similarly fetid swamp of Blogs for Bush, where you will be informed that a work of fiction is slander. And it gets better from there–not the link to Focus on the Family to “debunk” the Code. Yeah–ground zero for the Kwazy Kwistian movement is showing the fiction behind this work of, uh, fiction. Fantastic.
I like shitty movies, but not this kind of shitty movie. I’m more into earnest but inept low-budget horror flicks than overblown fake blockbusters based on awful books. But I find the sad and predictable butt-hurt Christian conservative outrage amusing.
Zifnab
One more bit of bloody meat, in case Van Gogh wasn’t enough.
The Other Steve
Still not in America.
And it wasn’t a Muslin, which as we all know is a piece of loosely woven cloth.
But regardless, the main point is that it’s not America, where we might shoot people for a pair of tennis shoes, but not because we don’t like what they have to say.
The Other Steve
I love this woman in Iowa…
She’s had “DO NOT RESUSCITATE” tatooed on her chest, because she is afraid Bill Frist and the Kwazy Wing of the Republican party might try to keep her alive forever.
The Other Steve
Ok, fair point. Missed that part.
Yes, the radical right is crazy enough that they might bomb a producer’s house I suppose. Possibly not, but well I hope Ron Howard has hired extra security just in case.
But except for the Kwazy Wing of the REpublican party, we don’t have a lot of people running around shooting people because they don’t agree with what they say. One of the perks of living in America.
ppGaz
Hear, hear. I just made that my official response to all whiney-righty pseudo-christian buttheads.
demimondian
The far right doesn’t want to make Pym Fortuyn a hero…you see, he was gay.
rachel
Real Christians are too busy feeding the hungry, healing the sick and supporting the oppressed–you know, obeying Christ?–to waste their time on some stupid movie. Or on the bunch of other stupid crap the current crop of pharisees has its panties in a wad over these days.
Steve
I can’t imagine the thought would ever cross their mind.
Jim Allen
Way off topic, but is anyone else worried about the resurgence of Marxism in West Virginia?
Pb
That’s a KKK reference, right?
RSA
I don’t think so. I haven’t read his most recent, but I slogged through Angels and Demons. Here are a few examples of Dan Brown’s “intelligence” in that book:
A Harvard “symbologist” explains that ambigrams in word form (words that can be read the same right side up and upside down) seem utterly impossible. Really? How about “pod”, which took me about ten seconds to come up with?
The symbologist is comfortable discussing computer graphics with students on the quad at Harvard, but elsewere seems (so far) to lack the most basic knowledge of computers. He’s also thrown by the mention of technical terms such as “particle beams” and “xenon”, wondering if what he’s listening to is still in English.
A pilot ferrying around one of the characters claims that jets will soon be obsolete, replaced by aircraft such as the Mach 15 rocket they’re flying in.
One of the early plot points is that a CERN scientist has been able to produce anti-matter, in a project aiming to unify science and religion by reproducing a Big Bang and connecting it to Genesis. The fact that this kind of connection (for what little it’s worth) could have been made as early as the 1920s doesn’t dawn on any of the theoretical physicists in the story.
jcricket
With nationally followed right-wingers like Malkin, Savage, Coulter & Gibson (not to mention Powerline, LGF, etc) calling for the death of anyone they perceive to be a traitor, can “apostate” movie producers be far behind?
We’ve already seen that medical professionals who do things the radical right opposes should be afraid.
Ann Coulter just fomented actually a near violent confrontation between her supporters and counter-protestors at a lecture she was giving.
We don’t need to look far to see the radical right’s violence and support for violence is here and real. It may not be as pointed as a single “Christianist” killing a movie producer and putting a note on their chest, but it’s just as worrisome.
Rey
Yes they can. They are very, very good at it.
KC
Can’t quite remember the last time a producer was killed by a Muslin in America.
And I can’t quite remember when a doctor at a Planned Parenthood clinic was killed by a Christian.
Oh Wait!
KC
Oh, and BTW – f#ck Xtians, Moslems, Jews and all the other religious zealouts who purport to tell human kind how to live their lives and be satisified in poverty while living in gilded palaces.
Religion is the biggest and oldest pyramid scheme around.
Period.
DougJ
Have you guys checked out the fence proposals at Confederate Yankee? I don’t see how they could be serious, but I’m pretty sure they are.
http://confederateyankee.mu.nu/archives/176970.php
The best part is somebody there made a joke about landmines and they all said it was a great idea. I’m going to have to start spoofing there.
skip
There is a distinction between fiction and fiction masquerading as a historical novel. The movie will leave millions of people believing a number of inventions are facts—starting with the Council of Nicea’s agenda .
I am an absolutist about freedom of the press, but one must reflect on what it tells us that this movie get top billing when the play Rachel Corrie isn’t even allowed to be seen.
To paraphrase that immortal windbag Larry Summers, this movie is anti-Catholic in effect if not in intent.
I’m sure John is looking forward to defending the song & dance version of the Protocols of the Learned Edlers of Zion.
Sojourner
By your definition, gnosticism, islam, Judaism, etc. are anti-Catholic.
As an American citizen and a gnostic, that’s not a path I care to go down.
Steve
I assure you that if the book about Rachel Corrie sold 40 million copies, there would be no shortage of venues looking to put on the play. It really doesn’t have much to do with freedom of speech, freedom of the press, etc.; it has to do with theater owners wanting to make money. Few people want to stick their neck out to show something controversial if there’s nothing in it for them.
Jess
Actually, Fortuyn’s murder had nothing to do with Islam or immigrants–he was killed by an animal rights activist (native Dutch) because he supported bringing back mink farms. I was living there when it happened, and it was one of the most bizarre and unexpected things my Dutch friends had ever witnessed–generally politics are more pragmatic than ideological there. They were worried that they were being infected with American-style extremism.
The Other Steve
When I was in Britain, there were fences everywhere. On the way to the place I was working there was a military base I would walk by.
They had an interesting fence. It was two rows of cyclone wire fencing, with concertina wire on top. The rows were about 2 feet from each other. Then there were rasberry bushes growing in the middle, and they’d been there long enough to spread out on either side. Not the easiest fence to climb over.
It looked nice, but was rather nasty.
That was typical of the British style of building fences. Deadly, yet not so obviously ugly.
The fence around the Parliament building was similar. Deadly, nasty, but yet also pretty. It was these tall iron bars, and at the top were these things that looked like Fleur de Lys, except made in a three-dimensional fashion with sharp knive edges.
Most all fences in England had sharp pointy spikes at the top.
ET
The Washington Post seems to think this book was ready made for Hollywood. Interesting quote from the Washington Post (5/19/2006) review.
But most filmgoers probably know all this, because most of them have probably read “The Da Vinci Code,” a starchily written potboiler that despite its graceless prose and turgid expository digressions has sold more than 40 million copies. Fans of the book will understandably be curious to see how it fares on the big screen; this is a book so movie-ready that it needed only a few “Fade Ins” and “Fade Outs” to qualify as a shooting script. If Howard’s “Da Vinci Code” doesn’t take the story in any radical new directions (no one will object to the understandable cuts he has made in narrative and characters), he delivers what the book’s admirers presumably want: a live-action illustration of the story they’ve had in their heads for three years.
Bad book = bad movie
drindl
I think it’s only a matter of time till the wingers start murdering people who disagree with them. I mean, why do they build these huge arsenals if they don’t plan to use them? I lived in the Catskills a few years back and the mountains were crawling with heavily armed ‘milita’ – 100 miles from Manhattan.
neil
This point might have been made already, but I just think it{s delicious to see Andrew Sullivan getting all hot and bothered about blasphemous media, and how people should be stopped from broadcasting their heretical lies.
But this is a movie, not cartoons, so it’s _much_ more serious.
r4d20
“I am going to begin to think the Romans had the right idea.”
Wow. I have been asking all of my friends why were EVER stopped feeding them to the lions. It wasn’t persecution at all, it was preventative self-defense. Notice how they started burning us at the stake the moment we stopped throwing them to the cats. Monotheism = Mid-east cultural imperialism.
Stand up for the Old Gods!!! From Wotan and Thor to Indra and Soma baby!!!!
skip
” if the book about Rachel Corrie sold 40 million copies, there would be no shortage of venues looking to put on the play. It really doesn’t have much to do with freedom of speech, freedom of the press, etc.; it has to do with theater owners wanting to make money.”
Yeah, money plays a role for sure, but Rachel Corrie wasn’t squelched for anything to do to with money. It was political pressure—period.
Maimonides
“I am going to begin to think the Romans had the right idea.”
Thank you about twenty times over for this post. I’ll be so damn happy when this book/movie has gone the way of the Celestine Prophecy and J.Lo.
Steve
Right, political pressure that only made a difference because the play wasn’t a revenue generator. That was my point.
T. Gray
I have a friend who calls the bestsellers by Brown and Crichton et al “easy readers for adults.” I think she nails it pretty good.
Pooh
You ask, the wankers respond…
Devil's Advocate
The so-called Christians are up in arms anout a bad movie! Interesting!
How come they are not up in arms about the rampant pedophilia among Catholic priests?
Scandals have been erupting not only in the U.S., but in Belgium, Ireland (!), France, Australia, etc… for the past twenty years.
I guess the American Taliban thinks it’s O.K. to molest little kids, but taking on the Opus Dei, now, that is a serious crime.
The Opus Dei is a nasty, secretive society, that has always supported right-wing regimes. The Opus Dei suported Hitler’s Nazi regime and Mussolini Fascist regime. It supported the Pinochet regime in Chile, as well as the dictatorships in Argentina and Brazil. God only knows what rotten dictatorships they support now. One can be sure, however, that they are protecting the financial interests of the Vatican.
As a Catholic brought up in Europe in a Catholic family, I know quite a bit about the Opus Dei, and some of of its satellites such as the “Faith and Light” movement.
None of it is pretty.
Some Other Brian Guy
Good point Devil’s Advocate.
The rightwing in America not only supports child pedophilia, but is most likely involved in the creation of a cottage industry of sick perverted sexual deviancy.
What with the priests raping small children, and Bush Administration officials trying to lure them into their own homes. Not to mention all of the other bizarre twisted deviant behavior that has come under scrutiny in years past, such as health officials forcibly sodomizing his own wife, or candidates for Senate found trying to manipulate their television star wives into having public sex.
As they say, where there is smoke there is fire, and these guys are smoking like there is no tomorrow.
I wouldn’t even be surprised that Falwell’s first time was with his mother.
The Other Steve
Just bought tickets for tonights performance of Da Vinci Code. I’ll report on how wonderful the film is after I see it.
tzs
Heard that the movie made pots and pots and pots of money this weekend, in spite of having been flamed by the critics.
Looks like in Italy it grossed twice the previous maximum for any film. Hee hee.
tBone
Saw the movie tonight. Briefly: take “National Treasure,” surgically remove all of the humor, and then add about 30 unnecessary minutes, some nifty CGI effects, a great Ian McKellen performance, and a weird proto-mullet for Tom Hanks.
It’s too long and has some truly groan-worthy dialogue that sounds like it was probably lifted directly from the book, but despite that I ended up enjoying myself. Not a classic by any stetch of the imagination, but a decent popcorn flick.
Paddy O'Shea
Nothing like a little fundie umbrage to guarantee some big box office.
CNN: ‘Da Vinci Code’ opens with estimated $29 million – Film is on track for year’s biggest opening-weekend gross
http://www.cnn.com/2006/SHOWBIZ/Movies/05/20/davinci.opening.ap/index.html
An article on Reuters/UK said it is setting records in Italy. The Pope really shouldn’t get into film criticism.
The Other Steve
Saw the movie last night. It’s really quite good. The movie was extremely respectful of the religious debate, and made it extremely clear that the Opus Dei nimrods were not acting on behalf of the Pope or anything like that.
Lot’s of good action. I thought Tom Hanks character felt a bit rigid, but then he’s supposed to be some sort of wonky professor so maybe that’s ok. He does well on thoughtful aspects of the script, just not the action sequences.
Audrey Tautau was fantastic, as was Ian McKellen.
Overall, I’d give it probably a 7 out of 10. It’s not Lawrence of Arabia by any stretch, but it’s a very good movie. On par with everything else Ron Howard and Tom Hanks have done together.
Sine.Qua.Non
Does anyone remember the movie Willem Defoe was in that was so overly protested in the same manner: The Last Temptation of Christ
Oh, yeah, and Pope’s factors now admit to the MYSTERIOUS SECRET CODE
jeff
There was much discussion earlier about issues relating to shit sandwiches. It’s been addressed.
http://www.salon.com/comics/tomo/2006/05/08/tomo/index1.html
jeff
By the way. Da Vinci Code did 77M this weekend. Not too shabby (MI-3 only did did 48M it’s first weekend, I haven’t seen it yet but probably will when the crowds thin out. I love thriller FICTION.
JOHN H.
IF ANYONE WANTS TO READ A GOOD BOOK AND KNOW THE TRUTH ABOUT JESUS, READ THE BIBLE AND THROW AWAY ALL THE OTHER JUNK. MEN DISTORT THE TRUTH AND ONLY IT PROVIDES THE REAL ANSWERS. ROMANS 12:2 SAYS “DO NOT BE CONFORMED TO THIS WORLD, BUT BE TRANSFORMED BY THE RENEWING OF YOUR MIND, THAT YOU MAY PROVE WHAT IS THAT GOOD AND ACCEPTABLE AND PERFECT WILL OF GOD” AMEN