Like what I saw on the repeat of Entertainment Tonight on Channel 5 like on last Thursday or something that when Mary Hart was interviewing the leading man in The Da Vinci Code's Tom Hanks on board the Eurostar about preparing for the premiere of the movie at the Cannes Film Festival, he was saying that it is like a 'recipe for disaster'. The fate of the movie will go either way no matter what happens.
I am having this freakish feeling it has almost happened. I am now saying this from someone who had read the book. Now the world's press are starting to lash out whatever they want (with what the reports saying being mixed reviews as yet) of the movie adaptation of probably the most controversial bestseller of all time. Maybe I can add, not since the time of Harry Potter where some of the Christian communities around the world tried to ban it because it claims the books promote 'witchcraft'. Really, sometimes I wonder how come I am part of these two phenomeon. The Harry Potter one had kind of died down some how, but occasionally there are waves of it which always threaten to haunt me. I am referring to people who try to condemn, that is.
I know everyone has different views over the novel version of The Da Vinci Code and the movie itself, but then maybe it's worthy to know that the novel was first published in 2003. What happened to the world I know back then? SARS dominated the headlines. The whole retaliation from the States in regards to 9-11. On a personal scale for me, it was my O-Level year; it was the time the only phenomeon I knew then was Harry Potter and American Idol. LOL.
So since our family maid had returned home (she lives in Indonesia) to visit her family yesterday till the week after next, it's time for me to help out in the household chores, whether I want it or not. And this morning my mother was telling me to sweep and mop the floor (she asked my brother to do it later on), I was like - 'What?!'. I mean, my sister was sweeping our parents' room then. Also, I was muttering this in my head - 'Just when I thought I am so disillusioned over how the press has see The Da Vinci Code movie overall...'.
When I muttered those words, it was already after I had actually read an editorial from our national newspaper here written by a senior writer about why especially our local Catholic and Protestant church communities are not too happy about The Da Vinci Code. The editorial could not have come at a better time when I am starting to be disillusioned at how almost the world's press is seeing the movie adaptation now. Feeling like crying and hating the world's press for a moment! The person who wrote the editorial in our national paper is actually a Christian himself as he stated before in his editorials, given in the light of The Da Vinci Code.
Maybe you are aware of the child molestation scandals in the news which shook the church for a period of time. It was all reported in the news before and that is really the first time, my impression of the church has shook somehow. Coming from someone who is not a Christian herself and what she knew of the religion is through the chapel sessions from her primary schooldays, it's shocking. This was mentioned in the editorial too. Pardon me if it angers anyone. I don't want to offend any Christians out there. I have Christian friends too (though not much) and so I understand.
When I was young, given how I have no much idea about the religion my mother practices (Buddhism, that is), I just followed her. But then as I grew up and starting to follow the news, I realised why 'wars' still keep happening in the name of religion. Like what Sir Leigh Teabing said in the movie (one of the best lines, as to me) - 'We are in the middle of a war. A war that has been going on for over 2000 years.' I think I was like 14 (it's five years back), I started to move away quietly from my family's religion. But not really breaking away altogether. Yet I told the person who is doing my identification card then (you have to be 15 years of age to do one here; and don't ask me why the person asked me the religion I'm in because I have no idea) I do not belong to any religion despite my mother telling me I should say I'm a Buddhist. One of the nastiest decisions I have ever made but...oh well. Nowadays I just tell friends and people I know I'm a free-thinker.
That is how I became a free-thinker. That is the story. It has really make me to see the news and now, The Da Vinci Code, in a better light. Unless people asked me of my religion, I don't say it. Because Singapore is a secular society. This is the way how I was brought up. With so many religions and cultures and everything in between here in Singapore, one is bound to have heard few of those cultures without knowledge. This is, me.
The time I can say we are lucky not to face real serious protests over The Da Vinci Code movie release like in many parts of the world. Anyhow, the person who wrote the editorial had said that he will go watch the movie someday given how he like who is playing the lead role of Robert Langdon - Tom Hanks.
Now with especially I had read the book (and re-reading it again to get a more clearer picture) and had watched the movie, I am very afraid at watching those documentaries on TV nowadays trying to separate fact from fiction about the book itself. It's not that I am against anything of the sort. I am open to ideas, I tell you all! It's just that like what I had kind of said before here - being a free-thinker has made me not legally bounded by the religion I follow. Freeing to accept whatever it's real and not. And as I was watching CNA's Documentary of the Week earlier - Breaking The Da Vinci Code, I was fearing for the worst. Whatever it may brought up and challenged whatever the book has stated. Yes, please don't tell me I'm an ignorant and believe whatever it's mentioned in the book. I had at least did research in a way or another through legal means (i.e. the Internet especially Wikipedia). I had actually feel like crying and breaking down each time I think of this. I don't really know why I always feel like doing that. Maybe reading a murder mystery (because it started out that way with the Lourve curator in the book Jacques Sauinere being murdered) had made me enthralled. I was never the Sherlock Holmes material, I freely admit.
BUT, it does not mean I follow whatever it is stated in the book. Yes, for sure, some of the things I found out through my own research actually did happened and existed. At least that comforted me somewhat. With those scholars, historians and whatever coming out to say about this and that, I really wonder now, whatever we know of Christianity...is it as a result of like what Teabing said this in the book - Our preconceived notions of this scene are so powerful that our mind blocks out the incongruity and overrides out eyes. He was referring to The Last Supper painting he was showing to Sophie in regarding to Mary Magdalene actually did appeared in the painting itself. The Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon even added that it's known as scotoma where 'the brain does it sometimes with powerful symbols'. I really wonder now. Do we really choose rather what we want to believe in only?
It had even made me asked this question for myself. I know I once studied History myself. Do I choose to believe what I learnt and studied from my past History classes or view it from another point-of-view about whatever it is being discussed. Time and again, I often asked myself these questions. Do I see Hitler as really the ultimate bad guy prior to my History classes or as the guy who wanted to strengthen Germany's power; do I see the supposedly first emperor of China Qin Shihuang as a total tyrant or someone who is being credited in unifying China as one; do I choose to believe that the Japanese chose to do what they have to do when they conquer China till the fall of World War 2 or is it just that they have no way out...all these questions, I had been asking myself for a long time. Now, The Da Vinci Code makes it to that list.
The grey area, which is right and wrong, it was first raised in Harry Potter & The Half-Blood Prince actually. Or at least it looks like that to me. The first time where things cannot be as clear as black and white to me.
Anyhow, just treating the whole The Da Vinci Code novel as just, a novel. Especially when coming out from my father friend's wife who is a Christian herself as I said it yesterday, I actually felt comforted somewhat.
