The Da Vinci Code

Gasp!  I have never seen this, or it's sequel for that matter before.  I don't know how much faith I have the equally milquetoast director Ron Howard and actor Tom Hanks can really effectively pull off a Catholic mystery thriller with teeth.  We'll see.  I does look terrific on blu-ray though!  Love those darks! The opening sequence in The Louvre was beautiful--most of the paintings I recognize and have an affiliation with "sacred" violence--so that was well done!

Runtime:  149 min

Rated:  PG-13

Language:  English, Latin, French

Color (2 Arricam Cameras, 1 Arriflex Camera)

DTS

Mostly filmed in the UK, both on Location and at Pinewood Studios, with a few jaunts to France and one notably visit to Malta.

Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1

Best Tagline:  So dark the con of man

The cast looms large!  In addition to Hanks, the also sports the talents of Jean Reno, Alfred Molina, Andrey Tautou, Ian McKellan, Paul Bettany, Jurgen Prochnow and French actor Jean-Yves Berteloot.   The film is famously based on Dan Brown's book of the same name--and created quite a buzz, mostly of anticipation, during it's production; though it was seriously protested by real members of Opus Dei, who regard the book and the movie to be highly exploitative of their movement.  One reason that they dislike so intensely, aside that it casts them in a conspiratorial bad light, is that parts of the story appear to try to connect them to the Illuminati, an enlightenment era secret society founded in Bavaria--a connection that would be tantamount to heresy to members of Opus Dei.

Trivia:

Julie Delyi and Kate Beckensale were both rumored to have been seriously considered for the role of Sophie.

Although the French government (a Catholic country) did allow limited night time access to the film crew for the opening assassination scene, the British government (technically a Protestant country) wasn't so forthcoming with access to Westminster Abbey, to which they denied access based on reasons of faith.  There reason:  the book was theologically unsound in depiction of real Christian religion.  Lincoln Cathedral in eastern England stood in for the Abbey.

Both Christopher Eccelston and Ingvar Egget Sigur∂sson (an Icelandic actor, who turned in a great performance as Grendel in Beowulf and Grendel) were both considered for the role of Silas (it went to Bettany).

The gargoyle inside Rosslyn Chapel is modeled on Ron Howards face.

Had to be covertly shown in Spanish theaters under the tittle Desperate Strangers.

And finally (and this is of interest probably only to me), Ron Howard's usual film composer James Horner was unavailable to score the film, to Hans Zimmer took over instead.  Which, for me, is a really good thing--I really can't stand Horner's compositional work--it is tedious, derivative and sometime in-appropriate to the subject of the film.  He is the only composer that I know that comes up with a new theme every decade or so, and then spends the next 10 years ripping his own work off.  Zimmer, on the other hand, is a serious composer of original (every time) film scores.

Creepy Catholic Fact 4:  Pope Gregory VII pretty much single handily started the first crusade in 1095.  He created a "Just War Doctrine" rooted in the power of the Catholic church alone.  It was an exercise that was, on the face it of the matter, to assist the Byzantine Empire (which was not Catholic) from a supposed siege by "infidels" and to return the Holy Land to Christian rule.  The real goal was encroachment and empowerment of the Catholic church in former Roman territories, and the deliberate weakening of the Eastern Orthodox faith there.  As a result in his holy call to arms, he managed to unleash Europeans hordes in the east.  Many who answered his call to fight were little more than Christianized barbarian hordes of the same type that had taken down the original Roman Empire.  The savagery in the east horrified local Christians there--rising, in some cases, to the cannibalization of Orthodox Christian children (this is fact, not a myth as The Vatican claims).  As he creator of the original theological groundwork for the 1st Crusade, Pope Gregory VII is also subsequently responsible for all Crusades that followed.

For more on the Crusades, I highly recommend Crusades, by Monty Python member Terry Jones.  He manages to at least tell the story from all sides, and of course, with considerable humor, despite it's subject matter.