Wednesday, May 17, 2006

"an albino, ful pale and straunge to se"

A ‘romaunce thrillere’ that could easily star Tom Hanks. Must be read to be believed.

[And while we're talking quietly snarky exposés of the vacuousness of contemporary pseudomedievalisms, "anybody can come up with a device permitting you to plunge to your death while waving your arms" is pretty good too].

8 comments:

Karl Steel said...

Here's something you might not have known:

"'The Da Vinci Code' will be the 68th movie since 1960 to feature an evil albino."

The blind and deaf probably attract pity (which is, we know, just this side of contempt), whereas albinos for some reason--they're uncanny?--probably are by and far the disabled most often depicted as villains.

Jeffrey Cohen said...

!

Anonymous said...

other problematic representations:

entertainment weekly did a special feature on tom hanks hair in this film... apparently they needed to develop a special gel that would straighten it so that he would have the "flowing" hair of a "harvard professor." eh?

MKH said...

Wait a minute -- you mean they did that on purpose? *shudder*

Jeffrey Cohen said...

This explains why in the Harvard Faculty Club the men's restroom has a big tub of Jiffy Hair Straight 'n' Flow.

As careful readers of this blog realize already, I do not believe that it is possible to be a serious academic without Great Hair.

Jeffrey Cohen said...

From the NYT review of the film, by A. O. Scott:

Is Christianity a conspiracy? Is "The Da Vinci Code" a dangerous, anti-Christian hoax? What's up with Tom Hanks's hair?

Luckily I lack the learning to address the first two questions. As for the third, well, it's long, and so is the movie.

Karl Steel said...

Ah! another review, this one from my Intended. Just passing it on.

I hope the irritable medievalist to whom she refers is K. the G. M. and not, say, Mr. Shadow.

Jeffrey Cohen said...

"Irritable medievalist" seems redundant.

Alison's review is indeed harsh, and very well written (favorite lines: "Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code is the most unforgivable book you'll ever see being read on the L train." "I hate that he makes false claims for his scholarship, only to slap his readers' faces for being so credulous.") The comments posted afterwards are, however, often frieghtening.