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DaVinci Code inspires ABC so-called "news" special

In case you missed it, the popular novel The DaVinci Code, which Ron Howard is set to direct as a feature film, became the basis for a television "news" special on ABC this week. (Film Forum has been following this developing project.) The meeting of historians, writers, spiritual leaders and mis-leaders gathered to discuss the veracity of the hypothesis offered as historical fact in the novel: that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene, that they had children, and that this sacred order of Christ's descendants were being kept secret by a spooky and clandestine group that included Leonardo DaVinci.

As you might guess, the result was something of a joke. Virginia Heffernan (New York Times) described the special as "a woolly and underthought treatment of the religious sophistry in The Da Vinci Code … both amusingly audacious and profoundly irritating. Ms. Vargas asks a series of questions that begin with, 'What if we told you,' which suggests that the ideas that follow are being proposed so that viewers might entertain them as beliefs—and thus be entertained, while not informed. This is a curious approach for network news."

Next week: A conversation with Todd Komarnicki: producer (Elf), director, writer, believer. Reviews of Love Actually, and more reactions to The Matrix Revolutions and Elf.

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November (Web-only) 2003, Vol. 47