by Kenneth Andrews

Created on: July 15, 2009   Last Updated: July 26, 2011

When I first moved to London five years ago, every tiresome person I met had a copy of Dan Brown's Da Vinci Code in their hand. "It lifts the lid on the Catholic Church," they'd tell me, staring at my right ear, "Seriously, it explains so much."

"Yeah?" I said dubiously. "Like what?"

"Everything! Sort of... whoooahhhh... whoooosh," they would say, waving their arms around to try and articulate some sort of enormous vague conspiracy. Guys, if you're only going to read one book per decade, make it a good one, please.

It goes without saying that I never got past the first twenty pages of the book, and I certainly didn't watch the accompanying film, which was full of very fine actors laughing all the way to the bank. And Tom Hanks.

Angels and Demons is the sequel to the Da Vinci Code, although the book from which it was adapted was actually published first. The zeitgeist is not quite so irritating about Dan Brown these days, so I thought I'd wander along and see what was up. It helped that I wasn't paying for the tickets, as I don't want to give any money to Tom Hanks, ever.

Angels and Demons

Directed again by Ron "Happy Days" Howard, with Tom Hanks again in the role of Robert Langdon, the film centres around the Vatican and the election of a new Pope. Scarily enough, the Illuminati are up to no good. They're a secret society dating back hundreds of years, but now they're back, and they're going to blow up the Vatican with an anti-matter bomb. No, seriously.

Four cardinals (candidates to the papacy) are kidnapped, and as the film unrolls, Langdon attempts to recover them before they can be dispatched in a variety of unpleasant ways - possibly best you don't see this film if you're not keen on rats...

All this nonsense gradually heads towards a climax, which, without giving away anything whatsoever, involves big explosions and people waving guns at each other.

So what did I think?

Well, on some sick level of my soul, I quite enjoyed this film. Although I find Tom Hanks to be possibly one of the most boring film stars who ever lived, he's never less than competent. Ewan MacGregor is always worth watching, although obviously as a Vatican official he's less likely to be getting his kit off, sorry ladies. The rest of the cast is not as well known as that of the first film, where Audrey 'Amelie' Tautou, Paul Bettany and Sir Iain McKellen were among those laughing all the way to the bank. Nevertheless, the performances are solid, and the fact that all the actors seem to

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