The DaVinci Code crashes after big opening weekend

The way I see it, Dan Brown should be very happy for Fandango, which allowed millions of theater-goers to see "The Da Vinci Code" before reading the reviews. Normally, movies don't crash, losing 57% of their audience in the second weekend. Especially not when the 2nd weekend is a holiday weekend and the first weekend was not. But normally people who see movies this stupid have already invested in their Jar-Jar Binks Happy Meal Action Figure. Go figure that the Happy Meal featuring a dead, naked museum curator with a pentagram scratched in his back didn't sell to well. (OK, I recycled that joke concept, but Da Vinci Code readers aren't known for having good memories.)

Come on, folks; the problem isn't Ron Howard or Tom Hanks. The problem is that you could read the entire 450-page book faster than you can watch the movie. I mean, I'm not saying that Brown is a devil-spawned, historically ignorant hack who simply makes stupid people feel smarter. But only because I'm alone at my keyboard and my cat kinda looks at me funny when I talk to her as if I expect her to know English.

I know, calling 60 million people "stupid" is no way to win friends and influence people, but by now I've used enough three-syllable words that I've lost most of them. My big issue is that the raves this story got proves how anti-Christian the nation's book reviewers are. Come on, this is the sort of book movie viewers should *warn* us about: "Caution: Put down this book and go smoke some pot. It will kill fewer brain cells and make you more capable of coherent conversation."

OK, Dan Brown fans. You don't have to respond saying, "it's only fiction." We all have heard that. First of all, Dan Brown has been all over all the talk shows insisting that the backstory is all true. But there's also something really nasty about making such horrific accusations of genocide against people in a backstory.

You see, backstories about historical peoples and characters usually are generally true. If they are preposterous, book critics will point it out, and knowledgeable readers' suspension of disbelief will be shattered, and they'll go tell their friends how stupid the book was. But Dan Brown's readers, apparently, aren't used to historical fiction, unless it's got that guy from the "I Can't Believe It's Not Butter" commercials on the front cover. Brown puts horrific slander in people's brain as little details, and the next time they hear those tid-bits, they say, "oh, yeah, I think I heard about that."

Some critics have pointed out how bad Brown's history is as if it were a product of his ignorance. This is not the case. Brown is quite well aware, I'm sure, that "Da Vinci" is not a name, as many critics have pointed out it isn't, but rather an origin. Please understand; he's trying to attract an audience which last read a book about Leonardo that was subtitled, "Heroes on a Halfshell."

As much as I'm picking on his audience for being nitwits, it actually is a simple truth that novels, since they contain far more information than a movie, can spend much more effort convincing people that something preposterous is actually believable. Many books I've read, particularly science fiction, have the more incredible portions of them toned down to maintain credibility. For instance, in the novel, "2010," we learned about plant life on Io by reading about how a Russian spacecraft was virtually devoured by a mobile plant; the novel could explain why Io might have mobile plants. In the movie, the crew thought they might have seen readings indicating a trace of photosythetic material.

There simply is no toning down the ridiculousness of Brown's story, because it's all necessary for the plot line. In the movie, it all seems so insipid that viewers apparently have been warning friends not to see it (as evidenced by its crash at the box office), if they are willing to admit to having shelled out $9 to see it in the first place.

But normally people who see movies this stupid have already invested in their Jar-Jar Binks Happy Meal Action Figure.

I do not own any Jar-Jar Binks action figures, but I did go to see this stupid movie. I didn't go because I was interested in viewing this drivel but because I felt compelled to be there for a non-Christian friend who was going. Someone had to be there to refute the lies and utter nonsense presented by this movie. As it turned out, this one friend had 4 Christian go with him to the movie to make sure he knew it was tripe. So 5 tickets sold. I can't speak for the other 3 Christians, but I resent Ron Howard making a movie filled with lies. He got his last few dollars out of my pocket ever as did Tom Hanks. They are skilled at what they do, but just as I won't buy a Dixie Chicks CD because I refuse to put money into their pockets (plus I didn't really care for their music anyway), I also will no longer put money into the pockets of people that make movies so full of lies that I feel compelled to refute them. And to top it off the movie stunk.

It wasn't even internally logical. Perhaps Brown or Howard can explain why the people who supposedly were attempting to keep the non-divinity of Jesus a secret were praying to Him? If He's not the son of God then it's pointless.

Are there other FORMER Catholics out there who, like me, have a different perspective on this?

I see the "historical" data in the book for what it is - it conveniently substantiates the premise upon which the whole book is based - it's literay liscence. But I also see (more in the book than in the movie) the underlieing use of this data to define the development of Catholic doctrine and policy (or, to be blunt, "rules") in the early days of the Church. Brown's books portray the Church as fearful that the fold will discover the secret of Jesus's relationship to MM and that it will undermine the "divinity" of their teachings. To keep the masses (no pun intended) in their place, they developed a dictatorial attitude with a stringent code to be adhered to. Of course no one could ever adhere to it, so you were left with the tremendous guilt of never being good enough. The Church also weilded tremendous power throughout the Middle and Dark ages. If I am not mistaken, this was when a lot of its doctrine was written. Keeping the people under their thumbs was critical to the continued expansion of the Church's domain.

As a former Catholic, with 12 years of Catholic education, I am more interested in this protrayal of the Church's attitude of indoctrination, than in his use of questionable historical data. Dan Brown uses the "Holy Grail-Mary Magdeline" secret to establish the need for the Church to adopt an attitude of secrecy and intimidation and the development of its extraordinary demands upon the congregation and the threat of eternal doom if one didn't comply. I always wondered about some of the teachings of the Church - like plenary indulgences and Pugatory. Who was it anyway, that told the powers-that-be that a person needed to say a given number of prayers to get another soul into heaven (yes, there were lists with numbers)? Or how did they know that another soul , who wasn't "good enough" when they died, would be waiting in Purgatory until enough prayers had finally been offered up for them. Of course, a person or persons never knew if enough prayers had been offered. In school, we were actually given detailed lists of what was a mortal sin and what was a venial sin. I can't even remember all of the other categories of sin that we were taught. And, by the way, this was an all girls high school with nuns and priest doing the teaching. Think that was a fertile climate for indoctrination?

I am in my mid fifties. Most Catholics (or former Catholics) remember the Vatican Council in the 70's. Out of nowhere, the Church endorsed the prospect that Catholics could, in some circumstances, be a free thinking entity and that maybe, some of the things that had been taught as rigid truth, should now be considered "suggestions". That rocked my world. Many of us were suffering under the oppressive nature of the Church and its "demands". Slowly, the Church's endorsement of free thinking (and the general attitude of the Freedom Movement in the 70's) led us to "questioning" and then "denial". I stayed with the Church for many more years until my children were grown and moved away. Then I became an agnostic for several years. I looked back at my life and realized I would never be good enough. I try not to harbor bitterness toward the Church (for one thing, I am still afraid it might be a Mortal sin).

Finally, this thought. I have to wonder if Dan Brown is a "recovering Catholic" also. He sure put into words a lot of things that I had been pondering for a long time.

P.S. At the age of 50 I began to attend the Baptist Church and one day it hit me - I WAS good enough because Jesus died on the cross and forgave all of my sins. He didn't expect perfection. What a releif it was to invite Jesus into my heart!

>> Now who is misleading. <<

Actually, it might be... What I had read was actually said, "distribution costs, SUCH AS the theater owner's take...

>> They are fortunate to make 5%. <<

But only 5%? I don't think so. Or we may be talking apples and oranges. It's widely said that supermarkets have "profit margins" of 0.5% and less on their groceries. And yet, I KNOW markup is about 70% on much of it, because I've done the ordering. Heck, we used to order Macaroni salad for 6 cents a pound (circa 1993) and turn around and charge $2.99! My guess is that they meant after all other costs were paid for. And I've also heard restaurants make their profits off the drinks, yet their markups are often around 1,000%! So maybe you're thinking NET profit, and I'm talking GROSS markup?

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