Well, I finally finished reading The DaVinci Code. The first half was exciting and intriguing, with the “gravitational pull” that I once heard Philip Yancey talk about at a writer’s conference, the momentum propelling you onward. Then you get to the middle, where Sir Teabing lays out a sordid history of conspiracy and repression regarding the truth about Jesus and Mary Magdalene. That part disturbed me because it was just so doggone heretical.

But after that, the book bogged down, lost its gravitational pull. And Dan Brown resorted to assorted implausibilities. I no longer felt eager, let alone compelled, to keep reading. So I forced myself to finish the thing, like stale chocolate cake after a full meal at Smokey Bones. Now I’m done and can happily move on to something else.

I’ve not yet seen the movie, which has been lambasted by every critic I’ve read. Of course, if they had given the movie good reviews, Christians would say, “Aha! Another example of the liberal media supporting an effort to discredit Christianity.” Jerry Falwell et al don’t know what to make of “liberal media” folks criticizing something which is, at heart, anti-Christian. Oh, what a complex world we inhabit!

Anthony Lane of the New Yorker is one of the top movie critics, and I devour every review he writes, whether or not I care about the movie. Lane is incredibly entertaining and dumps molten sarcasm on any movie (or element of a movie) he dislikes.Such was the case with “The DaVinci Code,” though in this case, Lane also skewers the book. You must read Lane’s review in the New Yorker. It’s a LOL read.

For example, in the movie Sir Teabing talks about the Council of Nicaea. Lane writes, “We get a flashback to the council in question, and I must say that, though I have recited the Nicene Creed throughout my adult life, I never realized that it was originally formulated in the middle of a Beastie Boys concert.” He mentions the appearance of a villain “hitherto suspected by nobody except the audience.”

Of the book, Lane says, “no question has been more contentious than this: if a person of sound mind begins reading the book at ten o’clock in the morning, at what time will he or she come to the realization that it is unmitigated junk?”