Your Daily Dish

Feeding Outrageous to you Daily

Hide Advertisement
  • Animals
    • Farm
    • Pets
    • Zoo
    • Wildlife
  • Family
    • Grandparents
    • Kids
    • Parents
  • Health
    • Exercise
    • Food
    • Medical
  • Humor
  • Lifestyle
    • News
    • Science & Tech
    • Travel
  • Videos
Site logo
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT

Review: ‘Inferno’ Never Ignites

By Robin Milling 3 min read
Advertisement - Continue reading below
Source: SONY Pictures Entertainment, Inc.
Source: SONY Pictures Entertainment, Inc.

Inferno, based on the bestselling novel by Dan Brown completes the book-to-screen trilogy of The Da Vinci Code and Angels & Demons – but the third is certainly not the charm. With a busy screenplay written by David Koepp – who co-wrote Angels & Demons – the film reunites Tom Hanks and his buddy director Ron Howard.

The film begins with Bertrand Zobrist (Ben Foster) preaching about the inevitable extinction of man with a giant projection screen behind him showing amoeba-like figures undulating about as he urgently shouts into a wireless mic, “Humanity is the disease and inferno is the cure!” It’s unclear whether he’s a biogenecist warning us about the end of the world or just a maniac who found an audience. Foster’s fierce acting chops are wasted in flashbacks throughout.

Advertisement

Cut to the beloved book’s character Robert Langdon with Hanks reprising the role as the Harvard professor of symbology lying in a hospital bed in Florence, Italy with a bleeding head wound. He can’t remember how he got there, much less the word for coffee. Langdon’s nurse Sienna Brooks played by Felicity Jones (The Theory of Everything) informs him he is suffering from a gun shot wound and head trauma, which explains his mild amnesia. Then out of nowhere an Italian police officer starts shooting through the hospital looking to kill Langdon. Still disoriented he escapes with Brooks and on the way to her apartment he’s having fever dreams of a city drenched in blood and engulfed in flames.

The mystery Langdon is supposed to solve begins to unfold when they discover a cylinder seal which spotlights Botticelli’s “Map of Hell” illustrating the poet Dante’s dark epic poem, Inferno. All this somehow leads to hidden clues and an ambitious scavenger hunt across Europe literally racing to stop a madman from unleashing a global virus that could wipe out half the world’s population.

Source: www.florenceinferno.com
Source: Botticelli’s “Map of Hell” www.florenceinferno.com

Hanks and Jones should’ve taken running lessons from Tom Cruise for the scenes where they’re being chased through the streets of Italy.

Source: SONY Pictures Entertainment, Inc.
Source: SONY Pictures Entertainment, Inc.

Director Ron Howard seemed to have been more interested in getting to the ‘how’ instead of showing us the ‘why’ which might’ve invested us more emotionally in the end game. He uses obvious tropes of swelling orchestrations for the action and quieter pieces for the dramatic moments.

Source: SONY Pictures Entertainment, Inc.
Source: SONY Pictures Entertainment, Inc.

His script supervisor should’ve been fired for several continuity mistakes throughout the film. The Gaffe Squad at Premiere magazine who find film flubs would’ve had a field day pointing them out. In one scene, Langdon has a bloody stitched up wound which disappears and reappears. He has a blood-shot eye from a fight scene which is miraculously gone the very next day.

Hanks, who was so wonderfully nuanced as Captain Sullenberger in Sully, gives a plug and play performance. Perhaps he saw this as an opportunity to spend some time with the real star of this film: magnificent Florence, Italy. The locations feature its beautiful landscape, the town hall PalazzoVecchio, home to the famous Ponte Vecchio museum where the characters comb through classic artifacts and secret passageways in search of clues.

In fact even the tourism board has seized a marketing opportunity to align themselves with Inferno showcasing the locations used in the film on their website, “The Places of Inferno,” which is far more intriguing. But we’re not meant to be watching a travelogue.

Source: Palazzo Vecchio/www.VisitFlorence.com
Source: Palazzo Vecchio/www.VisitFlorence.com

Borrowing the inimitable words of Bruce Springsteen, “You can’t start a fire without a spark.” Inferno never ignites.

Advertisement - Continue reading below

sdfdsf

One-of-a-Kind Australian Koala Needs Help Getting a Name
Lifestyle
Margo Gothelf 2 min read

One-of-a-Kind Australian Koala Needs Help Getting a Name

15-Year-Old Canadian Discovers Lost Mayan City
Apple
Jason Owen 2 min read

15-Year-Old Canadian Discovers Lost Mayan City

Flyboard Air Is the Hoverboard You’ve Dreamed Of
Entertainment
Kenny Servera 1 min read

Flyboard Air Is the Hoverboard You’ve Dreamed Of

WATCH: Gone for a Year, Marine Surprises His Mother in Touching Reunion
Family
Margo Gothelf 2 min read

WATCH: Gone for a Year, Marine Surprises His Mother in Touching Reunion

Man With Down Syndrome Has Dream Come True When He’s Sworn in as Police Officer
Lifestyle
Lauren Boudreau 1 min read

Man With Down Syndrome Has Dream Come True When He’s Sworn in as Police Officer

99-Million-Year-Old Lizard Deemed Reptile ‘Missing Link’
News
Brian Delpozo 1 min read

99-Million-Year-Old Lizard Deemed Reptile ‘Missing Link’

Australian Pop-Up Shop Offers Pokémon Burgers
Food
Brian Delpozo 2 min read

Australian Pop-Up Shop Offers Pokémon Burgers

Say Good-Bye to the American Dream – Dusty  Rhodes Dead at 69
Entertainment
Ron White 2 min read

Say Good-Bye to the American Dream – Dusty Rhodes Dead at 69

Scholastic Pulls George Washington Book Off Shelves After Criticism of Slavery
Entertainment
Margo Gothelf 2 min read

Scholastic Pulls George Washington Book Off Shelves After Criticism of Slavery

Watch Woman Use Scrabble Game to Announce Pregnancy to Air Force Husband
Parents
Brian Delpozo 2 min read

Watch Woman Use Scrabble Game to Announce Pregnancy to Air Force Husband

New Otter Pup Makes Debut at the Bronx Zoo
Trending
Margo Gothelf 2 min read

New Otter Pup Makes Debut at the Bronx Zoo

New College Building in China Looks Remarkably Like a Toilet
Trending
Robin Milling 1 min read

New College Building in China Looks Remarkably Like a Toilet

sidebar

ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT

sidebar-alt

  • About
  • Contact Us
  • Terms of Service
  • Privacy Policy
  • For Advertisers