Angels and Demons

Genre: Thriller/Adventure

Director: Ron Howard

Cast: Tom Hanks, Ewan McGregor, Ayelet Zurer, Stellan Skarsgard, Pierfrancesco Favino and Nikolaj Lie Kaas

Showing at Kumari Hall 1

KATHMANDU: After the first adaptation of Dan Brown’s bestseller The Da Vinci Code, Ron Howard has tried yet again to adapt another bestseller of Brown, Angels and Demons. Though this time you will see Tom Hanks in bearable hair style the presentation and screenplay is yet again boring and uninteresting as the first one. After all the controversies both the book and movie have been surrounded with the movie leaves bland taste in your mouth and disappoints the book lovers. By far director has not been successful in capturing the essence of the mind-boggling book that has lot to present from dark secrets of Vatican City to the lost world of Illuminati, which sure keeps your adrenaline rushing.

Story begins with death of the Pope and Vatican staff along with the Carmelengo (Ewan Mc Gregor) prepares for the Conclave of the College of Cardinals to select the next Pope. The faithful crowd of nuns, priests and others await outside St Peter’s Square. On the other hand the audience is introduced to the grand world of CERN scientists, where they are busy with their path breaking experiment of anti-matter. Suddenly one of the heads of the project is killed and the murderer is successful to steal canister of antimatter. News breaks in Vatican City that long forgotten age old underground secret society of scientists, Illuminati has kidnapped the four most likely candidates for the next Pope and threatened to destroy the Vatican City with the droplet of antimatter.

To reach the conclusion of the kidnapping and threats and to break the codes of Illuminati Dr Robert Langdon (Tom Hanks) is summoned who along with Vittoria Vetra (Ayelet Zurer), scientist from CERN who can change the battery of the antimatter canister before it wipes up the existence of Vatican City from the face of earth, using the clues they found in the original copy of Galileo’s banned book from the archives of Vatican City. With clues and statues, keys and architecture leading them to the faceless murderer Langdon and Vetra unveils many secrets, which does not only lead them to the murderer but also to an unimaginable ending.

Best thing about the whole movie is of course watching Tom Hanks doing what he does the best — great acting. He sure looks every inch of the passionate, dry humoured Robert Langdon and tries his best to carry the whole movie on his shoulder. The cinematography and the presentation of the gran-deur of Vatican City is bre-athtaking. Every passage, artwork, every corner, ev-ery wall is a piece of art and also carries lots of meaning, which fascinates all. Ewan McGregor does justice to the role of passionate and god loving Carmelengo. Ayelet Zurer is passable and does not have much to do. Though the director has tried to compact the book into two hours movie he fails to create any fear or interest on the whole. The depth needed to understand antimatter is almost nil making it just a threat and nothing else. And the Illuminati history is not as impressive as in the book. Over all the movie just gives you more reason to visit Rome and enjoy its rich architectural beauty and of course learn a bit about the history of Vatican City and Illuminati. All in all not bad for a single watch with friends.