The Da Vinci "Load"

On Tuesday night, B and I, along with someone from her work and one of their friends, went to see The Da Vinci Code at an "original language" cinema in Frankfurt.

The film itself wasn't too bad, though it didn't contain as much detail as the book. I think this would have been hard to do, given that the book spends a bit of time covering the history of The Knights Templar, etc.

The disappointing part of the film was really the ending, which they changed a fair bit from the book. I won't go into it, but let's just say that they made some really strange decisions, that make absolutely no sense.

But, back to the real part of the story - the film viewing experience.

We rocked up to the cinema, and found seats. The film was due to start at 8:00, but I think the ads started rolling maybe 10min after that...and kept rolling for the next 45 minutes! That's right, 45 minutes of ads and previews! WTF?!?!?! I don't even watch the stupid things at home, so why would I want to pay to see 45mins of these things?

Ok, so bullshit ads are over, and the film begins. It's a good story - particularly for us nerds - and we are really into it by time the film is about half-way through. Then, in the middle of a chase scene, the film suddenly stops, and we have an "intermission". When was the last time you went to a film with an intermission? For me, it was about 10yrs ago, in a dodgy little cinema that they set up in Ocean Grove during Xmas.
The intermission lasted about 10-15mins. Just long enough to spoil the mood, and let all the built up tension drift away. Nice work, idiots!

Maybe next time we will try the cinema in Darmstadt. They don't show films in original language all the time, but surely the experience will be better.

Tschüß
'Brush.