Angels & Demons

WARNING: This review is hidden because it reveals the content of the film.
Click here to show this review. I had a terrific time watching “Angels & Demons”. I haven’t seen this bad of a thriller with this many high-calibre actors in a long time. It’s a truly ridiculous plot that had me howling as I attempted to decipher the impossible clues given to a hero that is able to solve them all faster than you can say “Sherlock Holmes”. I picked up this film to get caught up on 2016’s “Inferno” and if it’s half as nutty as this one, it’ll be one of the most memorable movie-watching experiences I’ll have all year.

Professor Robert Langdon (Tom Hanks) has been summoned by the Vatican police to help solve a mystery. A vial of antimatter particles has been stolen from the Large Hadron Collider and is going to be detonated under Vatican City at midnight! To make things worse, Pope Pius XVI has just passed and the papal conclave is busy electing the next Pope. They’ll all be blown up unless Langdon and Dr. Vittoria Vetra (Ayelet Zurer) can solve a series of clues that will tell them the location of the bomb and of four kidnapped cardinals, the favorites to be elected pope. Who is taking responsibility for this crime? Is it Satanists? No. Think more Earth-bound. Protestants? No. Think older. … Philistines? NO! It’s none other than the Illuminati, a secret society dedicated to science: a group that has managed to infiltrate every major organization in the world. Not only the Church but governments too. Even “Adam Watches Movies” has been infiltrated! Save us Langdon!

All joking aside, this film’s plot belongs in a padded cell. It’s one of those films that was written backward in order to have a big splashy conclusion. When you find out what the villain’s plan was, you realize that it makes absolutely no sense. There were so many places where it could’ve gone wrong that no one in their right or even crazed mind would’ve gone for it. Even before then, the picture is filled with implausible developments. Right from the get-go, I knew this was going to be a bad picture. Dr. Vittoria, who turns out to be a doctor specializing in physics, medicine and languages because you know, doctor’s can do anything! Discovers a dead body inside a locked room. The room itself can only be accessed via retinal scan, which explains why the body she discovers is missing an eye. But wait. Who has the patience to carefully extract a single eyeball in order to get inside the room? And how did they get through the locked door to steal the man’s eye? You might argue that the eye was plucked out and the body dumped there, but why bother with that? Why not kidnap the man while at home and cut off his head, carry it around in a bag and bring that with you?

This film is filled with a thousand questions, all of which can be answers with “Uh…. ” I know the picture’s got a reason why there’s antimatter involved instead of say… a nuclear device which would be just as effective, but let me ask you this. Assuming that antimatter COULD be generated using the Hadron Collider, how did the Illuminati know that it would blow up? Did they take a tiny piece and test it out? Since we’ve never detonated antimatter before, how did they know it wouldn’t destroy the whole universe? What if it didn’t do anything and was canceled out when it touched regular matter? See what I mean about questions not having any answers?

Let’s move on. There’s a lot to say about the plot holes and questionable developments in "Angels & Demons" but if I point out every little problem in detail, reading this review would take longer than watching the movie. The fact is that this story is simply unbelievable. There is no reason why the Illuminati would leave clues to their crimes. If you buy that they would, there’s still no way you’ll be able to swallow Langdon and Vittoria solving these cryptic phrases in the tight deadline they’re given. I was having flashbacks to Adam West’s Batman confronting the Riddler! It’s maddening to watch.

I have to criticize not only the plot but also the script given to the actors who, to their credit, do well in their roles. Every single conversation sounds like it was written for idiots. People re-iterate information they know other people already know. Easily decipherable phrases are meticulously and pointlessly explained, wasting the time of the audience and the characters that are desperately rushing to save the Vatican. I encourage you to watch the film in order to have some laughs. When you do, count how many times Langdon or Vittoria explains to someone something they should already know. You’ll lose track.

As a film that’s “So Bad it’s Good”, I have two criticisms. First, this picture isn’t badly acted and second, doesn’t wind up being as predictable as you expect. Sure it makes for some truly jaw-dropping revelations throughout, but I wanted my loud exclamations of “guilty! ” 9 minutes in to be accurate. It’s not destined to be one of my favorite bad movies, but when an antimatter bomb in a serious thriller is the least preposterous development, you know you’ve got something special.

I’ll be coming back to “Angels & Demons”. It’s a delight to rip to shreds. I just know that with each subsequent viewing, I’ll find a new nut in this pile of squirrel excrements. If you like it legitimately, I say let’s watch it together. We can discuss it afterward and we’ll see whose rating seems to better reflect the quality of the film. (Theatrical version on DVD, September 28, 2016)