Angels & Demons (2009)

Directed by Ron Howard. Starring Tom Hanks, Ewan McGregor, Ayelet Zurer, Stellan Skarsgård, Pierfrancesco Favino, Thure Lindhardt, Nikolaj Lie Kaas, David Pasquesi, Cosimo Fusco, Victor Alfieri. [PG-13]

The pope has passed away, the Illuminati have kidnapped the four most-favored candidates to fill the vacancy, and a canister of antimatter has been stolen—better call symbologist Robert Langdon! He’s joined this time by a CERN scientist played by Zurer, but she’s frequently turned into a passive observer moping from scene to scene; it’s not like Hanks fares much better seeing as how Langdon’s passion for semiotics, mythology, and ambigrams is never fully explained or understood (although his first line of dialogue in this movie suggests that he’s a Sherlock Holmes-wannabe). Okay for a while, with a little less mumbo-jumbo and a little more narrative gallop than its predecessor, but the pic turns lumbering and abstruse in the middle, giving way to too many absurdities and coincidences to swallow during its crawl to the finish line; there’s no sense that the filmmakers (including scenarists David Koepp and Akiva Goldsman) had any faith in the conspiratorial convolutions, which doesn’t leave the audience with much to cling to. Though easily the best outing in the series to date, it’s still crummy filmmaking at service to an even crummier puzzle (and just as hostile to Catholic doctrine as the previous picture); the “twist” ending can be seen coming from a mile away…though standing that far away would take you beyond the boundaries of the Vatican. The first live-action sequel made by either Hanks or director Howard, and it’s bad enough to make one wish it had been Splash 2 instead.

33/100