Angels and Demons (2009)

Directed by Ron Howard

Written by David Koepp, Akiva Goldsman, based on Dan Brown's novel

Cast Tom Hanks, Ewan McGregor, Ayelet Zurer, Stellan Skarsgård, Armin Mueller-Stahl

IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0808151/

Reviewed by Päivi

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Like so many others, I started my friendship with the author Dan Brown with his novel Da Vinci Code. Few years ago when I was traveling in New Zealand and had already almost two months behind me, I needed something to read and rest my head. I found Angels and Demons from a bookstore and after that the next few days I spent sightseeing the amazing New Zealand by day and adventuring in Vatican by night. After that experience I thought, wow, this would be great to see as a movie!

Now my wish has come true - Angels and Demons is released as a movie version. Tom Hanks continues as the professor Robert Langdon specialised in symbolism as he did in the movie version of Da Vinci Code. (I have always had problems with Hanks as Langdon because he is not at all that convincing, handsome professor I pictured him in my mind...) Langdon is invited to Vatican City after the Pope has died and four cardinals - preferiti, the most popular choices to become a new Pope - have been kidnapped by an ancient secret society called Illuminati. A cryptic message is left behind and the Vatican wants the world famous symbolist to help them in saving the lives of the cardinals.

At the same time a container of antimatter is stolen from the LHC lab (Large Hadron Collider) in CERN Switzerland. A physicist studying the antimatter, Vittoria Vetra (Ayelet Zurer), has traveled to Vatican as well because not only have the cardinals been kidnapped, also the whole Vatican is in danger of exploding because the antimatter may work as a bomb.

While the Pope's camerlengo (Ewan McGregor) heads the papal office and leads the cardinals into a conclave to try to elect a new pope. Langdon and Vetra run around the Vatican and Rome in search of the ancient Path of Illumination, the kidnapped cardinals and the antimatter container.


Angels and Demons the movie is filled with action. Everything happens within five hour timeframe and as the pretty complicated story is squeezed into two and a half hours, the action is at times breathtaking. The screenplay is written well, it sticks together and does not fall apart despite the various possibilities. The focus of the story is mainly in the riddle of the Path of Illumination, the four elements of science and how they are combined with the four missing cardinals and pretty much everything else from the book is left out.

For someone not familiar with the novel, this is one hell of an action ride with interesting twists and turns and a very different angle for a mystery thriller. It is fascinating to see how the Vatican works and see a glimpse of the secrets vaults of Vatican (which are of course not real because director Ron Howard was not allowed to film in Vatican but he had to recreate Vatican elsewhere). But for those who know the story. the thrill gets lost at times, and it is often difficult to really stay interested in what happens to who.

Overall, Angels and Demons is pretty loyal to the original story, is well acted, has good action sequences, interesting twists, introduces us to the art and history of Vatican and Rome, but is a bit soulless. It runs it's course in a decent way, but instead of being either black or white, it leaves a somewhat grey feeling.