Movie Review: “Inferno”

The latest installment in Dan Brown’s Robert Langdon series, Inferno hit the big screens this weekend, starring Tom Hanks, Felicity Jones, Omar Sy, and Ben Foster. Directed by Ron Howard and written by David Koepp, the sequel to The Da Vinci Code and Angels & Demons is fast-paced, thrilling and mysterious.

Inferno begins as Harvard professor, Robert Langdon (Tom Hanks) wakes up in a Florence hospital, with a head wound and no memory of the past 48 hours. Dr. Sienna Brooks (Felicity Jones) is his caretaker, and saves his life from Vayentha, a female cop who attempts to assassinate him. Langdon discovers that he was given the  “Faraday pointer”, which projects a modified version of Botticelli’s Map of Hell, based on Dante’s Inferno.

He and Dr. Brooks are swept up in an elaborate hunt for a deadly virus created by Zobrist (Ben Foster), an influential billionaire to help “solve” the problem of overpopulation. Zobrist cleverly named his lethal virus “Inferno”, and hid clues around the world for his successor to find and follow.

The World Health Organization’s director (Sidse Babett Knudsen) gets involved, and throughout the film the audience is left wondering who the truly good guys are, and who’s on the hunt for the virus for selfish gain.

Despite the film being directed by Ron Howard, and starring the beloved Tom Hanks, the film felt disjointed and the plot line was all over the place. Honestly the film feels like it’s trying too hard, and put too much into one film.

A positive note on Inferno – I appreciate the fact that it  wrestles through some ethical questions, such as “What is the value of a human life?” and “Is it better to sacrifice some to save many?” It whetted the audience’s appetite to dive deeper into some of those questions, and I spent some time after watching the film researching more about Dante. I enjoyed the fact that his work played such a large role in the film.

In conclusion, I wouldn’t discourage seeing Inferno – it was entertaining and I’ll watch anything with Tom Hanks, but be prepared for a slightly unbelievable film.