Film Review: Inferno

"I Want To Know What I'm Involved With..."

In the IMDB trivia page for Inferno, the wildly unwanted continuation of Ron Howard's big screen adaptations of Dan Brown's ridiculously popular string of novels, one of the most interesting facts was that during production the film was hidden under the code-name "Headache" due in part perhaps to the constant concussion that professor of symbology Robert Langdon apparently suffers from throughout most of the film's bloated 120 minute run-time, yet in my own personal opinion, the "headache" in question can only relate to one thing; the effect the film has on those who bear to see it. Not only is Inferno one of the most painfully boring films I can remember seeing in a long, long while, with recurrent fidgeting and patches of drowsiness inevitably resulting in short yet effective cat naps, my experience of watching Tom Hanks and Felicity Jones run amok across Europe in order to locate their next museum-infested clue was indeed one of utter horror, one which will not escape my memory quickly, unlike the bland and completely ludicrous story which encompasses Inferno.

Where other films this year, particularly the woeful array of summer blockbusters, have suffered from fundamental issues of awful storytelling, Inferno takes such a core element of film-making and throws it into one of the rings of hell, with not one moment of dramatic tension or effective storytelling giving the movie the right to command its' shockingly long two-hour runtime, a runtime which feels almost twice as long due to the filmmakers decision to create dull, two-dimensional characters who are hell bent on running from museum to museum in order to find the titular "Inferno", a deadly disease created by Ben Foster's kooky radicalist, Bertrand Zobrist, who believes the only way to sustain humanity is basically to destroy it, a plot line left over from Utopia anyhow, and a plot line which results in the said disease being carried inside a jiffy bag which floats harmlessly within the Basilica Cistern. No, I'm not kidding. 

With a twist as obvious as the "radical" twist-ending in this year's Morgan, which although I'd fallen asleep already to really understand what it all meant, still managed to annoy me to the extent I thought falling asleep might make it better, and an ending what verges on the edge of cheesy, cliche-ridden claptrap, Ron Howard has succeeded in creating a true stinker of a movie, one in which not only the audience will be bored of ten minutes in, but has even effected the actors on-screen with Tom Hanks seemingly passing the time in order to pick up the cheque and ride out his mistake of signing on for three Dan Brown-based movies, and whilst Felicity Jones at least brings some sense of kooky campness during the second half of the movie, you can't help but feel she would rather be back on the set of Rogue One as fast as possible. Inferno isn't the worst film of the year, but it is definitely the most boring cinematic achievement I can remember in recent years. And remember, I've seen The Cobbler. 

Overall Score: 3/10