Angels & Demons

On Friday evening, our landlord met us at the house to show it to another couple interested in renting it. The prospective renters this time around were a young couple who looked barely old enough to be out of high school and who have "a medium sized dog, but she is super-well-behaved!" I don't think that our landlord liked them any better than the not-quite-divorced school teacher with half a zoo who came to see it on Tuesday.

The most annoying part of their visit was the fact that they wanted to see the inside of all the closets, to get an idea of the available closet space, something we were not prepared for and rather annoyed with, considering the closets are where most of our firearms are located, not to mention that we use most of them as storage and therefore, they are not meant for public viewing. Fortunately, they didn't spend much time asking questions, so the visit was over quickly.



After they left, we headed out to see "Angels & Demons" at the local movie theater, which we'd originally planned on doing Tuesday, but Tuesday's showing ran late and we missed the beginning of the movie and opted to see it another day. Turns out, Friday may not have been the best choice of days, since it seemed like everyone and their cousin were at the movie theater.

There are a few things I dislike about going to the movies, most of which have to do with the fact that it's difficult to actually enjoy a movie while sharing a huge room with a lot of other people. There are the obvious annoyances, such as being blocked in at the middle of a row, with no way out should you need to go to the bathroom during the movie; or people eating (loudly), or even better, carrying on a conversation throughout the movie; or kids texting on their cell phones during the film.

In the past, we haven't really have any issues with the drawbacks of movie-going because we've primarily gone on weekdays, and therefore were able to enjoy the theater without crowds of people and the annoyances that come with them.

This time, since it was Friday, the people were out in force.

As these things go, the couple that sat next to us turned out to be the sort of stereotypical fat rednecks carrying giant tubs of popcorn that one sees in bad cartoons. The first thing I noticed about them were their giant tubs of popcorn which reeked of butter and salt, which immediately made me nauseous. I dislike popcorn on the best of days, but she smell of that slathered-on butter .... YUCK!

Since these fine folks didn't understand half of the movie, particularly where foreign words were involved (there's a fair amount of Italian and Latin in the dialogue), they felt the need to explain these to each other. Loudly. And generally wrongly.

Best of all, when I needed to get up to tinkle - I swear, movie theaters put something in their drinks that just makes me have to GO! - they couldn't even be bothered to make any attempt to let me pass, so I ended up tripping and clambering over their big feet and fat legs, trying my best not to fall flat on my face or end up planting any of my body parts smack in their faces. It was really quite frustrating. Seriously - if someone tries to get past you, at least make an effort to move your body parts out of the way. Don't just sit there and snicker while shoving popcorn into your face!

Beyond the fact that the whole theater experience wasn't exactly what I would describe as fun, the movie was worth seeing. I was surprised, and maybe a little shocked, by how much they had changed the film's storyline from the actual book, as there was quite a bit that was profoundly changed or missing altogether.

What took me by surprise the most was the character of the killer, the Hashshashin, who is played by Danish actor Nikolaj Lie Kaas, and who bears little resemblance to the assassin of the book. I can only echo the questions movie reviews and other bloggers have already asked - exactly how did the movie assassin turn out to be a hired hitman, one who even lets the two main characters (Robert Langdon and Vittoria Vetra) go since he hasn't been paid to kill them. That's quite a change from the fanatical Muslim hitman and his contempt toward the Catholic church who quite happily kills anyone who stands in his way and kidnaps Vittoria with hopes to rape and kill her before the night is through.

I guess that sort of character would not have been politically correct, and we can't have that, now...

Overall, while changed a lot from the book, the movie had its good points and certainly kept me in my seat, though not on the edge of it. The cinematography is pretty, the story line flows well even though it's so different from the book, and Tom Hanks delivered a great performance. It's worth seeing. But buy the book, anyway, because that's definitely worth reading.