Actors playing American "symbologist" and French detective have this in common:

They are both clueless. Tom Hanks has already made light of concerns that TDVC presents an unfair and misleading picture of Christianity and the Catholic Church. The Christian Post reports that French actress Audrey Tautou (who plays cryptologist character Sophie Nevueu) is now uttering the "it's just entertainment" line:

Amid continuous religious controversy regarding ''The Da Vinci Code,'' French actress Audrey Tautou, co-star of the new film, is saying critics should remember that the work is based on fiction.

Tautou, who plays the cryptologist Sophie Neveu in the film, is reportedly surprised at the ongoing debates. After all, the movie is intended as entertainment, she says. Tautou herself was brought up in a church-going culture, and says she would never act in a film that was derogatory to the Christian faith.

“The controversy, any of it, doesn’t worry me,” she says. “There have been hundreds of books written on this subject and this is just fiction…. It is not a true story or a documentary. It is also not a religious movie.”

“Everyone should be aware that this is just a thriller,” she adds.

Which begs the question: What is so thrilling about TDVC? In addition, how many references to religion, religious beliefs, and religious figures does a movie need to have to constitute a "religious movie." But she is probably correct. If the movie is anything like the novel, it must be an anti-religious movie, specifically, an anti-Christian movie. How thrilling. How entertaining.

Comments

[Steve T.]

I think some people really just are clueless about the Christian faith and the implications of an alternate history.

It reminds me of an interview I heard from Mars Hill Audio, by the author of "Consuming Religion". His comment was that we have so commodified religious beliefs that they no longer, in our culture, have the logical content we - who take them seriously - expect them to. The result is that people can mix and match beliefs from various religions according to their taste, w/o feeling the tensions or apprehending the contradictions involved. Similarly, some will interact with a story like TDVC and just will not make the connections.

It could also be a symptom of understanding "faith" as a mere "belief-tradition" rather than a "knowledge tradition". The latter deals with facts, while the former is relegated to the land of wishful thinking, and trusting in spite of what reason dictates.