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The Da Vinci Code: A Biblical Response

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Critics Pan Da Vinci Code

By Ashley Forbes
CBN News Assoc. Producer

CBN News -- (CBN News) - The early word is out on The Da Vinci Code: Not only is it bad theology, critics say it's a bad movie.

The critics got to see the film Tuesday at the famous Cannes Film Festival in France, and they were anything but kind.

It was the first major showing of The Da Vinci Code, and it couldn't have been the reaction the studio was hoping for. Press reports from the film festival say the audience - full of movie critics - laughed and snickered at the movie.

"Nothing really works. It's not suspenseful. It's not romantic. It's certainly not fun. It seems like you're in there forever," Stephen Schaefer of the Boston Herald told Reuters.

One reviewer from the Times of India told Agence France Press, "At the high point, there was laughter among the journalists. Not loud laughs, but a snicker, and I think that says it all."

And Variety said, "Director Ron Howard and screenwriter Akiva Goldsman have conspired to drain any sense of fun out of the melodrama."

But despite the bad early reviews, analysts think the movie will open strong this weekend.

Still, scholars and Christians say big bucks at the box office don't equal historical or theological truth.