Angels & Demons

The fact that Angels & Demons the novel was written before The Da Vinci Code but filmed after enables Dan Brown and the filmakers to make the film an extended apology to the Roman Catholic Church for the furore caused by The Da Vinci Code.

First, the film sees Brown's central character, Robert Langdon, reaching a rapprochement with the Vatican which allows him access to its archives and enables him to solve the mystery which threatens to undermine that Church. This occurs in a fictional post Da Vinci Code context which mirrors the actual disapproval of The Da Vinci Code by the Vatican.

Then, the unfolding of the plot of Angels & Demons reveals the central mystery as fraudulent, the use of a supposed historical secret society for contemporary personal and political ends. This is, of course, the wider Church position on the supposed historical materials on which Brown based the plot of The Da Vinci Code.

The film itself is, like the book, a prime-time plot-driven thriller where what will happen next is the main (or only) reason for both watching and bearing with the unlikely twists and turns to the plot that Langdon uncovers and survives.

I'd read the book some time ago but didn't remember which character was the villain or the main twist on which the plot turns. That either says something sad about my memory or more probably about the pleasure of Brown's thriller format being found in the roller-coaster read to resolution rather than in any sense of substance in plot or character. I enjoy the occasional roller-coaster ride, just as I enjoyed Angels & Demons, but wouldn't want that experience to characterise my everyday existence or my usual reading.

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Nick Drake - Time Has Told Me.