Enough With the Da Vinci Code

Just over two years ago, Doubleday Publishing released a novel that accomplished something that few books do these days – it sold. The Da Vinci Code became THE book for middle-aged clems all over the world, but particularly in our country. You couldn’t board a plane without seeing seemingly half the passengers carrying this trash.
Even a few people that I know jumped on the bandwagon. At a college reunion last fall, two or three friends asked if I had read it. Uh, no. “It makes you think” was the general response to my less-than-enthusiastic reply.
I’ll acknowledge that I have an aversion to anything that becomes popular unless I was among the first to jump on it. Nobody’s going to tell me what I should like.
In this case, however, I feel that I’m right. I can’t think of anything more boring than a suspense novel that can supposedly questions the whole belief system of Christianity. Call me a heathen, but there’s already enough real evidence to question whatever faith I was raised to believe. Add to that the actions of fundamentalists who want to take over schools, politics, and the entertainment that I choose to enjoy in the privacy of my home.
Some time last year came word that the book was to be turned into a Ron Howard movie lead by beloved actor Tom Hanks. Forrest Gump goes to Rome?!? More yawns.
I assumed that like most boring summer blockbusters, this would be a movie that would come and go without affecting my life…just like I’ll never allow Julia Roberts, Will Smith, Tom Cruise or other hacks to enter my conscience.
Boy was I wrong. The past couple of weeks have been a complete nightmare. I can’t pick up a magazine or newspaper without a story about the actors involved, the author, or the new controversy created by church groups who for some reason had no problem with the publication of the book but somehow believed that a movie version would corrupt the lives of our entire country. I’m not just talking about silly entertainment rags. I expected People, Entertainment Weekly, and the Life section of USA Today to waste some space on this movie, just as they do for any so-called blockbuster. Hell, they’ll do the same next month and every other month for every piece of star-driven drivel.
But I never expected it to be a cover story in Time, or for a number of front-page stories in the news section of every newspaper in the country, including our goofy daily paper. Oh, the outrage of the fringe groups, including the little-known sect of Catholics called Opus Dei. These are the people who are backing some of the nuttier members of Congress, including Kansas Senator Sam Brownback and possibly Supreme Court Judge Antonin Scalia. They just love any pseudo-controversy that gives them the opening to tell me how I should live my life.
Yet it wasn’t just the print media jumping on the bandwagon. Television just couldn’t get enough of the story. Besides those goofy entertainment “news” shows featuring ass clowns such as Pat O’Brien and Ryan Seacrest, real news outlets also have featured far too many stories on the movie. Idiots on Fox News had their predictable daily fights over the supposed undermining of religious values, but they weren’t alone. Even the local channels had interviews with church leaders who either condemned the movie or claimed they would use it to “open a dialogue” with churchmembers.
Guess what? Despite unanimously awful reviews, last week the movie had one of the biggest opening weekends of all time. Yet the sky didn’t fall, nor were there riots in the streets. Hell, as far as I know O’Gorman High School didn’t even lose any of their athletic recruits. Please, people, lighten up. It’s fiction. Not great fiction, but nobody is claiming this movie’s a documentary. Let it have it’s three week run at the theater, and then it’ll disappear until it’s fall release on DVD, followed by the limited-edition multi-disc director’s cut released just in time for the holidays.