It was ? as I expected - absolutely pants! I was hoping the film would humanise the characters a bit more because they were completely unbelievable in the book, but alas not! Hanks and Tattoue were so one dimensional and completely forgettable ? no substance to their characters at all. Not surprising because their dialogue was them just explaining stuff! Ian McKellen however was brilliant! He camped it up big time! And I'm sorry but I thought Paul Bettany was good despite his bad reviews! I tell you what it reminded me of ? you remember those educational videos we used to watch at school? We'll it was like one of those ? but with good actors! Ron Howard did OK with the cinematography ? and visualised the long-winded explanations really well, but it didn't distract from the fact that it was a boring and highly pretentious film! Final comment; don't blo*dy bother ? go see X-Men 3 instead!