The Bubble Continues to Burst
Are there any good - or even mediocre - reviews of the DVC?
It feels slightly wicked to take such delight in all the bad publicity for this much hyped movie. Take Tim Robey's review in today's Daily Telegraph, with the telling title - 'What's the Latin for balderdash?'
Robey described the film as 'two and a half hours of rambling murk with an abjectly terrible script being read out over the top of it. The movie is talk, talk, talk, and such dull talk, constantly justifying its existence,...albeit one kitted out with an expensive slide-projector and some whizzy 3-D graphics.' Indeed, this 'talk, talk, talk' is a besetting problem in society - and even Holy Mother Church has been affected!
The stars, Hanks and Tautou, Robey suggests, 'ought to be wearing T'shirts saying "Stupid" and "Je suis avec stupide."' Even Paul Bettany, who plays Opus Dei member Silas, is merely 'a bit of cowled, sepulchral menace between recreational whiplashings.'
But the poor quality of the film doesn't make DVC any less harmful. I had lunch yesterday with an Opus Dei friend, Fr Joe Evans, who told me that, according to a recent survey, 17% of people questioned believed that Opus Dei is full of sinister hitmen like Silas! Three out of five British people are reported to believe that there is 'some truth' in the theory that Jesus had a family. As Robey points out, it is exactly the 'mulish nonsense' of the movie that will make it 'an Oscar-winning liability.'
It's still a great opportunity for catechesis. One of the best Catholic articles on the whole phenomenon is in the latest issue of the Faith Magazine and is penned by my former professor in Rome, Fr Joseph Carola , S.J. (whose name - and picture - often appears in The Roamin' Roman). Another version of his piece on the DVC can be found if you click here.
It feels slightly wicked to take such delight in all the bad publicity for this much hyped movie. Take Tim Robey's review in today's Daily Telegraph, with the telling title - 'What's the Latin for balderdash?'
Robey described the film as 'two and a half hours of rambling murk with an abjectly terrible script being read out over the top of it. The movie is talk, talk, talk, and such dull talk, constantly justifying its existence,...albeit one kitted out with an expensive slide-projector and some whizzy 3-D graphics.' Indeed, this 'talk, talk, talk' is a besetting problem in society - and even Holy Mother Church has been affected!
The stars, Hanks and Tautou, Robey suggests, 'ought to be wearing T'shirts saying "Stupid" and "Je suis avec stupide."' Even Paul Bettany, who plays Opus Dei member Silas, is merely 'a bit of cowled, sepulchral menace between recreational whiplashings.'
But the poor quality of the film doesn't make DVC any less harmful. I had lunch yesterday with an Opus Dei friend, Fr Joe Evans, who told me that, according to a recent survey, 17% of people questioned believed that Opus Dei is full of sinister hitmen like Silas! Three out of five British people are reported to believe that there is 'some truth' in the theory that Jesus had a family. As Robey points out, it is exactly the 'mulish nonsense' of the movie that will make it 'an Oscar-winning liability.'
It's still a great opportunity for catechesis. One of the best Catholic articles on the whole phenomenon is in the latest issue of the Faith Magazine and is penned by my former professor in Rome, Fr Joseph Carola , S.J. (whose name - and picture - often appears in The Roamin' Roman). Another version of his piece on the DVC can be found if you click here.
posted by Fr Nicholas at 2:04 pm
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