Factual error: Contrary to what the movie states, priests can be elected Pope - they are simply elevated to the rank of Bishop before taking the office.
Angels & Demons (2009)
Directed by: Ron Howard
Starring: Tom Hanks, Ewan McGregor, Stellan Skarsgard, Ayelet Zurer
Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.
Suggested correction: Him being only a priest was simply an excuse not to elect him. Those who did not want him to be pope were trying to find any reason to keep it from happening.
Any baptized Catholic male can be elected pope, although it has only happened once. Pope John XIX in the 11th century was a layman, ordained after his election.
Other mistake: After Langdon saves the last of the Preferati by diving into the fountain, he heads off to St. Angelo with dry clothes. Since it is only ten or fifteen minutes later, his clothes should be soaked.
Continuity mistake: When the antimatter explodes in the helicopter, the the shock-wave blasts off part of the roof inside St. Peter's Basilica, above the alter, obliterating everything below. However, in the scene where the Camerlengo self immolates himself at the altar close to the end of the movie, there is no evidence of the shock wave earlier, the candles are burning, oil lamps are lit and alter is intact. (01:54:10 - 02:07:40)
Trivia: Ron Howard's father, Rance, makes a cameo as one of the Cardinals locked in conclave. (00:32:10)
Trivia: Considering Dan Brown's works anti-Catholic blasphemies, the Catholic church would not allow Tom Hanks and director Ron Howard to shoot film scenes in two historic cathedrals in Italy's capital city: Santa Mariadel Popolo and Santa Maria della Vittoria. They were allowed to film external shots only.
Richter: You said they'd be killed publicly.
Robert Langdon: Yes, revenge. For La Purga.
Richter: La Purga?
Robert Langdon: Oh geez, you guys don't even read your own history do you? 1668, the church kidnapped four Illuminati scientists and branded each one of them on the chest with the symbol of the cross. To 'purge' them of their sins and they executed them, threw their bodies in the street as a warning to others to stop questioning church ruling on scientific matters. They radicalized them. The Purga created a darker, more violent Illuminati, one bent on... On retribution.
Robert Langdon: The Illuminati did not become violent until the 17th Century. Their name means 'The Enlightened Ones'. They were physicists, mathematicians, astronomers. In the 1500's they started meeting in secret, because they were concerned about the church's inaccurate teachings. They were dedicated to scientific truth. And the Vatican didn't like that. So the church began to, how did you say it? Oh, hunt them down and kill them.
Question: When Langdon and the Italian cop are trapped inside the sealed room of the Vatican archive and the air is shut off, how long could they actually survive in a space that size? In the movie, they start to suffocate almost immediately. (There is no long time lapse because the movie's plot depends on defusing the bomb within a few hours).
Chosen answer: In reality, they would have perished from CO2 poisoning long before the room ran out of breathable oxygen causing them to simply suffocate. Without knowing the exact dimensions of the room it is impossible to give any time more specific than "several hours" for this to happen in a room as big as that one appeared to be.
I just re-watched the movie, and as Langdon and Vittoria enter the room, it's mentioned to them that the oxygen levels are always kept at a bare minimum to protect the ancient tomes and documents stored there. That helps to answer my own question about why Langdon and the cop were so quickly affected when the power was shut off.
Question: What is the purpose of the boots on the rafters in the scene where they find the first murdered priest?
Answer: A suspense point. Just to make the audience think that the predator is up there.
Question: SPOILER ALERTS! Does anyone know why they changed the final symbol to the keys instead of the one in the book? Also why they left out that the Pope was Ewan McGregor's father?
Chosen answer: In the book, the location of the antimatter bomb is only revealed after the Camerlengo pretends to have a "vision from God" on the steps of the Vatican. By changing the symbol to one that actually provides a clue to the location, it allows Langdon to work out where the bomb is, to actually play some part in proceedings rather than passively stand by until the villain just takes everybody there as part of his plan. As for the Pope being the Camerlengo's biological father, this is a fairly late revelation in the book and requires a substantial amount of exposition, which would only serve to abruptly slow the film to a crawl during the climax. The Camerlengo's motives, his hatred for the church's indulgence of science, are strong enough to explain his actions without the additional detail of his parentage being necessary, thus it could be safely left out to keep the film's momentum going.
Join the mailing list
Separate from membership, this is to get updates about mistakes in recent releases. Addresses are not passed on to any third party, and are used solely for direct communication from this site. You can unsubscribe at any time.
Check out the mistake & trivia books, on Kindle and in paperback.