Angels & Demons

 Released Year: 2009

Directed by Ron Howard

Casted by:

Tom Hanks as Robert Langdon

Ewan McGregor as Father Patrick McKenna

Ayelet Zurer as Dr. Vittoria Vetra

Stellan Skarsgård as Commander Maximilian Richter

Pierfrancesco Favino as Inspector Ernesto Olivetti

Nikolaj Lie Kaas as The Assassin

Armin Mueller-Stahl as Cardinal Strauss

 Story:

Under the watchful eyes of Father Silvano Bentivoglio and Dr. Vittoria Vetra, the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) initiates the Large Hadron Collider and creates three vials of antimatter particles larger than any that have ever been produced before. Almost immediately, Father Silvano is killed and one of the vials of antimatter goes missing. At the same time, the Roman Catholic Church is mourning the sudden death of Pope Pius XVI in Rome and prepares for the papal conclave to elect the next Pope. The Camerlengo, Father Patrick McKenna, assumes temporary control of the Vatican. The Illuminati kidnap four of the 'preferiti' (the favourite cardinals to be elected pope) before the conclave enters seclusion and threaten to kill one candidate every hour and destroy all of Vatican City at midnight, using the missing vial of antimatter as a bomb. The Vatican summons symbologist Robert Langdon from Harvard University and Vetra from CERN to help them save the four preferiti and locate the vial.

Langdon listens to the Illuminati's message and deduces that the four cardinals will die at the four altars of the "Path of Illumination," marked by statues of angels in locations relevant to the four classical elements. Over the objections of Commander Maximilian Richter, head of the Swiss Guard, but with McKenna's consent, Langdon is granted access to the Vatican Secret Archives. He examines Galileo Galilei's banned book with Vetra. Following the clues and accompanied by Inspector General Ernesto Olivetti and Claudio Vincenzi of the Vatican Gendarmerie Corps, they arrive at the Chigi Chapel in the Church of Santa Maria del Popolo. There they find Cardinal Ebner dead, suffocated with soil and branded with an ambigrammatic word "Earth". They verify the second location is Saint Peter's Square but are unable to save Cardinal Lamassé; his lungs punctured and his body branded with "Air".

While Vetra studies Silvano's diaries, Langdon, Olivetti and Vincenzi locate the third church, Santa Maria della Vittoria, but are unable to save Cardinal Guidera from being burned to death. His body is branded with an ambigrammatic word, "Fire". The assassin appears and kills Olivetti and Vincenzi, while Langdon barely manages to escape with his life. Langdon and two Carabinieri officers race to the Water altar, the Fountain of the Four Rivers, where the assassin murders the officers and drops a bound and weighted Cardinal Baggia into the fountain. Langdon, assisted by bystanders, saves the cardinal, who tells him the Illuminati's lair is Castel Sant'Angelo. There Langdon and Vetra discover a hidden passageway leading to the Vatican, being used as a hideout for the assassin. Discovering a case with marks for five branding irons, they realize the fifth brand is for the camerlengo but are confronted by the assassin before they can alert McKenna. The assassin spares their lives, then cryptically warns them that his contractors were "men of God". He escapes but is then killed when his car explodes.

Inside the Vatican, Langdon and Vetra find Commander Richter hovering over McKenna with a gun, the Vatican symbol branded into McKenna's chest. Richter and Archbishop Simeon are shot by the Guards, and Langdon takes a key that slips from Richter's hand. The stolen antimatter vial is found in St. Peter's Tomb below the church, but the battery life is too low to risk re-connecting it to a battery. McKenna, a former military pilot, seizes the vial and uses an awaiting helicopter to fly above the Vatican. At a high altitude, he parachutes out as the antimatter bomb explodes overhead. McKenna is hailed a hero and savior, and the cardinals move to elect him pope. Langdon and Vetra use Richter's key to watch a security video showing McKenna speaking to Richter before the attack. The video reveals that it is McKenna, not the Illuminati, who masterminded the scheme. McKenna reveals that he murdered the previous pope because he felt the pope had betrayed the church by trying to bridge the gap between science and religion. Once McKenna had killed the pope, he intended to have himself elected to the papacy whilst rallying the most conservative Cardinals to his side. The recording is shown to the Papal conclave, and when it dawns on McKenna that he has been exposed he flees to a remote recess in the building where he is able to commit suicide by setting himself on fire.

The Vatican officially announces that McKenna died due to internal injuries suffered during his parachute landing, and Cardinal Baggia is named Pope Luke, with Cardinal Strauss as the new camerlengo. Strauss thanks Langdon for his assistance and gives Langdon Galileo's "Diagramma Veritatis" for his research, requesting only that Langdon's will contain a request that it be returned to the Vatican, and that any future references he may make about the Catholic Church in his future publications be done gently, to which Langdon replies, "I'll try."

 L² Scored: 6.5/10

L² Comment:

It has been such a long time I didn't watch any movie and update this blog... almost one month without any new update, a friend message me & order me to update soon or else he will dis-follow my movies' blog lol~

Well, I have been wanting to re-watch this movie, a sequel of "The Da Vinci Code". Angels & Demons was one of my favorite movie back in 2009 before i started to blog about movies review. However, watching it the second time, its a bit boring to be frank. Of course beside solving hints, Tom Hanks with a new girl running around like mad dog & the villain change to Ewan McGregor... Of course its a good movie still, but maybe not for the re-watching time...