The DaVinci Commode

The DaVinci Code movie opens today and it appears to be taking a beating by the critics: Exhibit A, Exhibit B. Some of the grief heaped on the movie seems to be carried over from how much the reviewer hated the book. For example, A.O. Scott reviews the movie by heckling a piece of Dan Brown’s writing. My review of the book was that it was the worst book that I couldn’t put down. A (minor, but increasingly annoying) problem that I had with the book is the idea that Robert Langdon is a “professor of religious symbology” at Harvard, a phrase that you will see repeated in every description of the book and movie. Is there such a thing? The Harvard listing of academic programs isn’t aware of it. Wouldn’t Dr. Langdon be a professor of religion who, maybe, specializes in religious symbolism? How about semiotics? Harvard doesn’t have a semiotics program either. Brown does, but Brown is decidedly less sexy than Harvard. Anyway, I am saving my movie dollars for the other controversial religious movie of the summer, 10 Things I Hate About Commandments.