THE DA VINCI CODE [2006]

Seek The Truth

Symbols are a language that can help us understand our past.
As the saying goes, a picture says a thousand words.
But which words?
Understanding our past determines actively our ability to understand the present.
So, how do we shift truth from belief?
How do we wrote our own histories, personally or culturally, and thereby define ourselves?
How do we penetrate years, centuries, of historical distortion to find original truth?
~Robert Langdon

Robert, look at the victim body: The Vitruvian Man.
It's one of Leonardo da Vinci's most famous sketches.
Bezu: And the star on his skin?
Robert: A pentacle.
Bezu: And its meaning?
Robert: A pentacle is ancient.
Symbols carry different meanings in different settings.
Bezu: This symbol, professor. This setting.
Robert: The pentacle is a pagan religious icon.
Bezu: Devil worship.
Robert: No, no, no. The pentacle before that.
This is a symbol for Venus.
It represents the female half of all things.
It's a concept called 'the divine goddess' by religious historians.
Bezu: You are telling me that Sauniere's last act on earth was to draw a goddess symbol on his chest? Why?
Robert: Captain Fache, obviously I can't tell you why.
I can tell you he, as well as anyone, knows the meaning of this symbol
and it has nothing to do with worshiping the devil.

He phoned my office today, several times.
He said it was a matter of life and death.
I thought it was another trick to get back in touch.
It seems when he couldn't speak to me, he reached out to you.
Whatever he needed so badly to say, he found neither of us in time.
~Sophie Neveu

Robert: Have you ever heard those words before, Sophie?
'So dark the con of man'?
Sophie: No. Have you?
Robert: When you were a child, were you aware of any secret gatherings?
Anything ritualistic in nature?
Meetings your grandfather would've wanted keep secret?
Was there ever any talk of something called The Priory of Sion?
Sophie: The what?
Why are you asking these things?
Robert: The Priory of Sion is a myth.
One of the world's oldest and most secret societies, with leaders like, Sir Isaac Newton, da Vinci himself.
The fleur-de-lis is their crest.
They're guardians of a secret they supposedly refer to as 'the dark con of man'.
Sophie: But what secret?
Robert: The Priory of Sion protects the source of God's power on earth.

Silas: Tell me, Sister, please, of the Rose Line.
Sister Sandrine: A rose line is any line that goes from the North to South Poles.
Set into the streets of Paris, 135 brass markers,
mark the world's first prime meridian which passed through this very church.
Silas: It hides beneath the Rose.

Sophie: Maybe there is something about this Priory of Sion.
Robert: I hope not.
Any Priory story ends in bloodshed.
They were butchered by the church.
It all started over a thousand years ago when a French king conquered the Holy City of Jerusalem.
This crusade, one of the most massive and sweeping in history
was actually orchestrated by a secret brotherhood, 
The Priory of Sion and their military arm, The Knights Templar.
Sophie: But The Templars were created to protect the Holy Land.
Robert: That was a cover to hide their true goal, according to this myth.
Supposedly the invasion was to find an artifact lost since the time of Christ.
An artifact, it was said, the church would kill to possess.
Sophie: Did they find it, this buried treasure?
Robert: Put it this way, one day The Templars simply stopped looking.
They quit the Holy Land and traveled directly to Rome.
Whether they blackmailed the papacy, or the church bought their silence, no one knows.
But it is a fact the papacy declared these Priory Knights, these Knights Templar, of limitless power.
By the 1300s, The Templars had grown too powerful, too threatening.
So the Vatican issued secret orders to be opened simultaneously all across Europe.
The Pope had declared the Knights Templar Satan worshipers
and said God had charged him with cleansing the earth of these heretics.
The plan went off like clockwork.
The Templars were all but exterminated.
The date was October 13th, 1307. A Friday.
Sophie: Friday the 13th.
Robert: The Pope sent troops to claim The Priory's treasure, but they found nothing.
The few surviving Knights of the Priory had vanished.
And the search for their sacred artifact began again.
Sophie: What artifact?
I've never heard about any of this.
Robert: Yes, you have.
Almost everyone on earth has.
You just know it as The Holy Grail.

Robert: You don't believe in God.
Sophie: No.
I don't believe in some magic from the sky.
Just people.
And sometimes that they can be kind.
Robert: And that's enough?
Sophie: Well, I think it has to be.
I think it's all we have.

A Cryptex.
They are used to keep secrets.
It's da Vinci's design.
You write the information on a papyrus scroll which is then rolled around a thin glass vial of vinegar.
If you force it open, the vial breaks, vinegar dissolves papyrus and your secret is lost forever.
The only way to access the information is to spell out the password with these 5 dials,
each with 26 letters.
That's 12 million possibilities.
~Sophie Neveau

Leigh: There are always 4, The Grand Master and the 3 senechaux, make up the primary guardians of the Grail.
The Priory's members span our very globe itself.
Robert: Philippe de Cherisey exposed that as a hoax in 1967.
Leigh: And that is what they want you to believe.
The Priory is charged with a single task, to protect the greatest secret in modern history.
Sophie: The source of God's power on earth.
Leigh: No, that's a common misunderstanding.
The Priory protects the source of the Church's power on earth, The Holy Grail.
Sophie: I don't understand.
What power?
Some magic dishes?
Leigh, chuckles: Has he been telling you that The Holy Grail is a cup?
To understand The Holy Grail, my dear, you must first understand The Holy Bible.

Leigh: The Good Book did not arrive by facsimile from heaven.
The Bible as we know it was finally presided over by one man, the pagan emperor Constantine.
Sophie: I thought Constantine was a Christian.
Leigh: Oh, hardly no, he was a lifelong pagan who was baptized on his deathbed.
Constantine was Rome's supreme holy man.
From time immemorial, his people had worshiped a balance between nature's male deities
and the goddess, or sacred feminine.
But a growing religious turmoil was gripping Rome.
3 centuries earlier, a young Jew named Jesus had come along, preaching love and a single God.
Centuries after His crucifixion, Chris's followers had grown exponentially
and had started a religious war against the pagans.
Robert: Or did the pagans commence war against the Christians?
Leigh, we can't be sure who began the atrocities in that period.
Leigh: But, we can at least agree that the conflict grew to such proportions that it threatened to tear Rome in 2.
So Constantine may have been a lifelong pagan but he was also a pragmatist.
And in 325 A.D., he decided to unify Rome under a single religion, Christianity.
Robert: Christianity was on the rise.
He didn't want his empire torn apart.
Leigh: And to strengthen this new Christian tradition, 
Constantine held a famous ecumenical gathering known as The Council of Nicaea.
And at this council, the many sects of Christianity debated and voted on everything,
from the acceptance and rejection of specific gospels,
to the date for Easter, to the administering of the sacraments, 
and of course the immortality of Jesus.
Sophie: I don't follow.
Leigh: Well, ma chere, until that moment in history
Jesus was viewed by many of His followers as a mighty prophet,
as a great and powerful man, but a man nevertheless.
A mortal man.
Robert: Some Christians held that Jesus was mortal.
Some Christians believed He was divine.
Sophie: Not the Son of God?
Leigh: Not even His twice removed.
Sophie: Hold on, you're saying Jesus' divinity came from a vote?
Leigh: Well, remember, in those days, gods were everywhere.
By infusing Jesus the man with the divine magic,
by making Him capable of earthly miracles as well as His own resurrection,
Constantine turned Him into a God but within the human world.
And he basically knocked the more distant gods out of the game.
Robert: Constantine did not create Jesus' divinity.
He simply sanctioned an already widely held idea.
Leigh: Semantics.
Robert: No, it's not Semantics.
You're interpreting facts to support your own conclusions.
Leigh: Fact, for many Christians, Jesus was mortal one day and divine the next.
Robert: For some Christians, His divinity was enhanced.
Leigh: Absurd.
There was even a formal announcement of His promotion.
Robert: They couldn't even agree on the Nicence Creed.
Sophie: Excuse me... 'Who is God, who is man?'
How many have been murdered over this question?
Leigh: As long as there has been a one true God, there has been killing in His name.

Leigh: Now, mademoiselle, where is Jesus sitting?
Sophie, with closed eyes: In the middle.
Leigh: Good.
He and His disciples are breaking bread.
And what drink?
Sophie: Wine. They drank wine.
Leigh: Splendid.
And one final question, how many wineglasses are there on the table?
Sophie: One? The Holy Grail?
Leigh: Open your eyes. [Sophie look at the painting] No single cup. No chalice.
Well, that's a bit strange, isn't it?
Considering both The Bible and standard Grail legend celebrate this moment as the definitive arrival of The Holy Grail.
Now, Robert, you could be of help to us.
If you'd be so kind as to show us the symbols for man and woman, please.
Robert, make a gesture of man symbol: This is the original icon for male.
It's a rudimentary phallus.
This is known as the blade.
It represents aggression and manhood.
It's a symbol still used today in modern military uniforms.
Leigh: Yes, the more penises you have, the higher your rank.
Boys will be boys.
Robert: Now, as you would imagine, the female symbol is its exact opposite.
[make another gesture] This is called the chalice.
Leigh: And the chalice resembles a cup or a vessel or, more importantly, the shape of a woman's womb.
No, The Grail has never been a cup.
It is quite literally this ancient symbol of womanhood.
And in this case, a woman who carried a secret so powerful 
that if revealed, it would devastate the very foundations of Christianity.
Sophie: You're saying The Holy Grail is a person? A woman?
Leigh: And it turns out, she makes an appearance right there. [point to the painting]
Sophie: But they are all men.
Leigh: Are they?
What about that figure on the right hand of our Lord seated in the place of honor?
Flowing red hair, folded feminine hands, hint of a bosom, no?
It's called Scotoma, the mind sees what it chooses to see.
Sophie: Who is she?
Leigh: My dear, that's Mary Magdalene.
Sophie: The prostitute?
Leigh: She was no such thing.
Smeared by the church in 591 A.D., poor dear.
Mary Magdalene was Jesus' wife.

And then, my dear, Jesus goes on to tell Mary Magdalene
that it's up to her to continue His church.
Mary Magdalene, not Peter.
The church was supposed to be carried on by a woman.
Few realize that Mary was descended from kings, just as her husband was.
~Leigh Teabing

Leigh: Now, my dear, the word in French for Holy Grail.
Sophie: Sangreal.
Leigh: From the Middle English, Sangreal of the original Arthurian legend.
Now, as 2 words, can you translate for our friend?
Sophie: Sangreal, it means 'royal blood'.
Leigh: When the legend speaks of the chalice that held the blood of Christ
it speaks in fact of the female womb that carried Jesus' royal bloodline.
Sophie: But how could Christ have a bloodline, unless...
Leigh: Mary was pregnant at the time of the crucifixion.

Leigh: For her own safety and for that of Christ's unborn child, 
she fled The Holy Land and came to France.
And here, it is said, she gave birth to a daughter, Sarah.
Sophie: They know the child's name.
Robert: A little girl.
Leigh: Yes.
Robert: If that were true, it's adding insult to injury.
Sophie: Why?
Robert: The pagans found transcendence through the joining of male to female.
Sophie: People found God through sex?
Robert: In paganism, women were worshiped as a route to heaven,
but the modern church has a monopoly on that in salvation through Jesus Christ.
Leigh: And he who keeps the keys to heaven rules the world.
Robert: Women, then, are a huge threat to the church.
The Catholic inquisition soon publish what may be the most blood-soaked book in human history.
Leigh: The Malleus Maleficarum.
Robert: The Witches' Hammer.
Leigh: It instructed the clergy on how to locate, torture and kill all freethinking women.
Robert: In 3 centuries of with hunts 50,000 women are captured, burned alive at the stake.
Leigh: Oh, at least that. Some say millions.
Imagine, then, Robert, the Christ's throne might live on in a female child.
You asked what would be worth killing for.
Witness the greatest cover-up in human history.
This is the secret that The Priory of Sion has defended for over 20 centuries.
They are the guardians of the royal bloodline.
The keepers of the proof of our true past.
They are the protectors of the living descendants of Jesus Christ and Mary Magdalene.

Jacques Sauniere was her grandfather.
You're the obsessive Priory scholar, Leigh.
You still keep lists of who might be in the Priory?
I'll bet Jacques Sauniere was on one of those lists.
He was on your list of who could be Grand Master, wasn't he?
I'll bet he was right at the top.
Consider, 4 men murdered?
The same number as the guardians.
What if The Priory was compromised, the other senechaux dead?
What if you yourself were dying, a Grand Master?
You'd have to pass the secret on to someone you could trust.
Someone outside the society.
Maybe someone whose training you had begun but never finished.
~Robert Langdon

 Sophie: Opus Dei, what is it?
Robert: A conservative Catholic sect.
Opus Dei is a prelature to the Vatican.
Sophie: You're saying the Vatican is killing people for this box?
Leigh: No, no, no. 
Not the Vatican and not Opus Dei, but we are in the middle of a war.
And one that has been going on forever.
On one side stands the Priory and on the other an ancient group of despots
with members hidden in high-ranking positions throughout the church.
And this Council of Shadows tries to destroy proof of the bloodline.
And that throughout history, they seek out and kill the living descendants of Jesus Christ.
Sophie: That's insane.
Leigh: Is it?
How many atrocities and scandals has the Catholic Church rationalized in its time?
And what happens if some persuasive scientific evidence emerges that shows
that the church's version of Christ is inaccurate?
What if the world discovers that the greatest story ever told is actually a lie?
Robert: A Vatican faces a crisis of faith unprecedented.

Sophie: Did you kill Jacques Sauniere?
Silas: I am the messenger of God.
Sophie slaps him: Did you kill my grandfather?
Silas: Each breath you take is a sin.
No shadow will be safe again.
For you will be hunted by angels.
Sophie: You believe in God?
Your God doesn't forgive murderers.
He burns them.

Robert: Leigh, harboring and transporting fugitives?
You are already implicated enough.
Leigh: You and I, Robert, have observed history.
Time has been our glass.
We are in history now.
Living it.
Making it.
'Implicated'?
I am on a Grail quest.
Forgive me, Robert, but you two may well have given this old man the greatest night of his life.
Thank you.

Leigh: When the 2 of you arrived at my home as you did, others might call it God's will.
I believed that if I had the cryptex I could solve the riddle alone,
but I was unworthy.
[to Sophie] But you, you have the reason to be here.
You're the last remaining guardian of the Grail.
Your grandfather and the other senechaux would not have lied with dying breath
unless they knew their secret was preserved.
Sophie: How could you know Sauniere's last words?
Leigh: Grail quests require sacrifice.
Sophie: You are a murderer.
Leigh: No, no. Robert, tell her.
When history is written, murderers are heroes.

For 2000 years the church has rained oppression and atrocity upon mankind
crushed passion and idea alike,
all in the name of their walking God.
Proof of Jesus' mortality can bring an end to all that suffering
drive this church of lies to its knees.
Their living heir must be revealed.
Jesus must be shown for what He was.
Not miraculous, simply man.
The dark con can be exposed.
Mankind can finally be set free.
~Leigh Teabing

Bezu: You used me.
Bishop Aringarosa: God uses all of us.

Only the worthy find The Grail, Leigh.
You taught me that.
~Robert Langdon

He forgot everything we've learned.
Everything we teach.
It's why we study history.
So we'll stop killing each other.
~Robert Langdon

 

Robert: Do you have any memories of your grandfather before the accident?Before your parents were killed?
Sophie: Yeah. No, I don't know. Why?
Robert: Because I don't think he was your grandfather.

Robert: The paper says the entire family was killed.
The mother, the father, the boy, 6, and the girl, 4.
But your name was never Sauniere.
It's Saint-Clair.
It's one of the oldest families in France.
It's from a line of the Merovingian kings.
Sophie: Sangreal?
Robert: Royal blood.
I was so wrong.
Sauniere didn't want you to help guard the secret of The Holy Grail.
Sophie, you are the secret.
You survived the accident, if it even was an accident.
The Priory found out, somehow they concealed the fact that you were alive.
They hid you with the Grand Master himself, who raised you as his own.
According to all of this, Princess Sophie, you are the heir, the end of the bloodline.
 The last descendent of Jesus Christ.

Robert: Okay, maybe there is no proof.
Maybe The Grail is lost forever.
But Sophie, the only thing that matters is what you believe.
History shows us Jesus was an extraordinary man, a human inspiration.
That's it.
That's all the evidence has ever proved.
But...
When I was a boy, when I was down in that well Teabing told you about...
I thought I was going to die, Sophie.
What I did, I prayed.
I prayed to Jesus to keep me alive so I could see my parents again,
so I could go to school again, so I could play with my dog.
Sometimes I wonder if I wasn't alone down there.
Why does it have to be human or divine?
Maybe human is divine.
Why couldn't Jesus have been a father and still been capable of all those miracles?
Sophie: Like turning water into wine?
Robert: Who knows?
His blood is your blood.
Maybe that junkie in the park will never touch a drug again.
Maybe you healed my phobia with your hands.
Sophie: And maybe you're a knight on a Grail quest.
Robert: Well, here's the question, 
a living descendent of Jesus Christ, would she destroy faith, or would she renew it?
So again I say, what matters is what you believe.

The Holy Grail 'neath ancient Rose Line waits.
Adorned in masters' loving art, she lies.
The blade and chalice guarding o'er her gates.
She rests at last beneath starry skies.



*****