My two cents

Ah, The DaVinci Code. Controversy and scandal wrapped up in a neat 454 pages/2.5 hours. There are many websites and books supporting and debunking the book, and frankly I don't have the knowledge or the desire to add my voice to the clamour that has arisen.
That being said, I do want to talk about the book and the movie (both of which I have read and seen (there are alot of subtitles in the movie)). What I want to say, though, has nothing to do with content. It has to do with style. I'll start with the book, just because.
All controversy aside, I wasn't that big of a fan of Dan Brown's book. I'll admit that the idea of the story is an intriguing one, and there is definitely room for suspense and thrills. However, I'm not all that 'wowed' by his writing style. When I read a Dan Brown novel (and I've read a couple, with the same feeling both times), I feel like everything is way overhyped. The emotions are extreme, and there is no subtlety. Take, for example, the following quotes: "The driver ignored the signs prohibiting auto traffic on the plaza, revved the engine, and gunned the Citroen up over the curb." "The agent revved his engine and sped off." The driver of the car didn't just drive up or leave. He revved the engine! He gunned it! He sped off! Also, I don't really like the repetition of the word 'revved'. There are other words that could be used, but that's a personal thing.
He is also fond of sentence fragments, used, I can only imagine, in an effort to try and heighten the emotion or do something. But I found it to be distracting. For example: "...she found the entire house uninhabited. Upstairs too." 'Upstairs too' is not a sentence. That isn't even the one I was looking for. There is another one that I can't find that is, in my mind, even more glaring. It's as though he thinks that using the short non-sentences that he is ratcheting up the emotion and making things more tense and punchy. But it doesn't, at least not for me. It's like the actor who reads all of his lines over emotionally (like stereotypical William Shatner). It just feels forced.
And finally, at least on style, the way he tries to include the suspense of secrets isn't very understated. When there is a secret that he isn't telling you, he shouts at you that he's not going to say. The female lead (Sophie) witnessed something that made her stop talking to her grandfather (who raised her after her parents died) and which basically traumatized her. Until she finally reveals her secret, Dan Brown hammers home the idea that she has a secret that was very scarring. Her emotions are always extreme when she thinks about it. I can't remember where exactly it occurs, but at one point, I remember that in one paragraph Sophie thinks about what she saw that was so awful and her she deeply saddened and troubled by the memories. And then there's a short paragraph where someone speaks or some small action takes place. The next paragraph is about how she is remembering her grandfather and the terrible secret she has and how awful it is for her. And it's not even like she was continuing a thought interrupted by action. They were two completely separate thoughts about the same thing. Again, the emotions are as extreme as they can get.
In fact, everyone's emotions are always extreme. There are no middle areas, it's all highs and lows. There is no balance. It's always a deeply disturbing moment, or flashes of rage or some sort of high emotion. It never stops, and it gets tiring after a while. This style of writing starts to lose all meaning after a while, and pretty soon there is no emotion left.
Also, the chapters are very short, which is nice in some ways, but makes it feel like it's been dumbed down in other ways, like he's writing solely for those with short attention spans. I'm not saying that anyone who enjoyed this book is unintelligent or slow-witted or ADHD. I just think he broke up the action entirely too much with chapters. That might just be a case of being used to longer chapters by most other authors, I don't know. There was just something about it that I didn't like.
All of that being said, it wasn't a completely terrible story. It was interesting to see how all of the clues and riddles were answered. The albino monk Silas was an interesting character. He was probably the character that I found myself caring about the most. My final conclusion about the book is simply this: controversy aside, I'm not a huge fan. I won't buy it unless I see it really cheap (like one of those $5 or less bins somewhere)(and even then, maybe not). I haven't read it for a while, but I think his previous book featuring Robert Langdon (the main hero of this book) was better, though I do recall being not completely impressed with it either (it is called Angels and Demons, a book about the Illuminati, and also with the murder of a pope). Frankly, I'm going to read one or two more Dan Brown books, and if his style doesn't impress me any more, I'll probably not read anything else he writes. His books aren't intriguing enough to excuse a poor writing style.
Now on to the movie. I must warn you, there may be spoilers in this section, but I'm not sure. I haven't written it yet, so I can't say for sure. How was the movie you ask? Well, it was only okay. I found the action to be forced in many places. I think it needed more explanation for much of it, details that would be found in the book, but not in the movie. There seemed to be leaps of logic or something that just didn't mesh well.
There were some interesting things to note, however. In the book, Robert Langdon was completely sold on the idea of the the church supressing Mary Magdalene and that Jesus was married and that the Priory of Sion secret society existed and that DaVinci was a grandmaster of it who worshipped the feminine goddess and wasn't a believer in the church or its teaching at all. In the movie, however, he's still skeptical. He argues with another character that everything the Priory stands for is only alleged and not proven. In the book he really says that it is true, all of it, and that the church is bloodthirsty and maniacal in its destruction of these truths. A note here: when Dan Brown talks about the church, he is basically referring to the Catholic Church, and he often uses the term 'The Vatican' as a direct substitute. Does it matter? I don't know. I just thought I'd mention it.
Also, I wasn't a big fan of the camera work/directing style. It wasn't terrible or distracting or anything. It just didn't really do much for me, though there were some interesting shots of scenery, if you want to call it that. I especially liked the shot of London from an airplane. That was pretty neat, neat enough to make me want to visit there even more.
Something that I found a bit odd was how the character of Sophie was dumbed down and Robert Langdon was smartened up. In the book they are both very brilliant people, and they each solve about half of the clues. In the movie, Sophie basically knows nothing and Robert figures it all out. Sophie is reduced to a blank slate who is simply there to be taught and to be shown clinging to old ways. When they come to a church to try and figure out a final clue, Robert and Sir Teabing go looking for a solution, calling back and forth to each other in an effort to find the answer. Sophie, on the other hand, walks around, looking uncomfortable and eventually acting as though she were scared. She doesn't actually do anything in the movie. It's weird because I thought that was a good part of the book, how both characters had their areas of strength and they both used those areas to figure things out. But not in the movie.
Silas is still interesting in the movie.
Well, there are my two cents worth on this phenomenon. I say you should read the book and see the movie just so you know what the big deal is and can talk about it to others, but that's really the only reason. On their own, they really aren't much.