**Ron Howard's Inferno.**
Dan Brown has made a lot of money from his mystery books, and his popularity has meant that virtually all of his stories have been ported to the big screen. For this film, Ron Howard adapted Brown's fourth novel, set between Florence, Venice and Istanbul. In the script, Robert Langdon wakes up in a hospital in Florence and discovers that he has been attacked and shot, and that he is being pursued because he knows something important, but has lost his memory. I mean, he knows as much as we do! He will be aided by an attractive doctor who will help him understand what is going on: so, we realize that a crazy Malthusian has decided to create a virus to decimate a third of the human race, and that he is about to spread it.
If in the previous films based on Brown we had notable successes, this film would be doomed from the beginning: “Inferno” is perhaps the least inspired and most poorly written book by this author. And there are no miracles in these things: either the source material is good, or you can forget it. The screenplay is also a poor and unhappy adaptation. Because? Because it completely alters the end of the book and gives us an alternate, clichéd, idiotic ending, staying true to the beginning of the story, which starts too abruptly to work well on screen. That is, the script changes things that it should leave and respects the part of the book that most needed adaptations! The dialogues and the construction of the characters also sound bad, and everything has a poorly finished appearance.
Ron Howard has reason to look at this film and bury his head in the sand like an ostrich. For a director of his caliber, with the accolades he has, this film is simply unacceptable. The amateurism, the carelessness, the almost negligent way in which details are approached… I would forgive a newcomer or an untalented director, but not Howard.
The cast again has the participation of Tom Hanks in the role of the symbologist. Keeping his record impeccable, the actor perfectly fulfills the role and gives us everything he owes, in a committed and consistent work. Felicity Jones also did a good job, with a skillful harmony between rationality and emotion. The rest of the actors are far below: Omar Sy and Ana Ularu added little and have very little screen time; Irrfan Khan and Sidse Knudsen do a little more and better, but remain in very secondary positions. Ben Foster pretty much counts for nothing.
Technically, the film relies heavily on green screen, massive CGI, and visual and special effects. Without them, the film collapses like a house of cards. I don't usually see problems in using these technologies, they can truly enrich a film, but here, I believe, they turned the film into a kind of giant video game, where everything is done against the clock, and where there are dangers so varied that we don't even feel them. The sets and costumes are pretty good, and the choice of filming locations respects the ideas and places the book visited. Also, the soundtrack, again by Hans Zimmer, is perfectly adequate. Unfortunately, the cinematography is thoughtlessly and inelegantly directed, and the entire editing job feels rushed, excessive and far too crude.
