Maybe not as far out as you seem to think

Every reputable archeologist and Bible scholar has absolutely slammed "The DaVinci Code" as historical rubbish. The alleged premises upon which it is based are (unfortunately and misleadingly) as fictional as the murder mystery. The presumed intimate relationship between Jesus and Mary Magdalen, for instance, is derived entirely from a single line in a single, badly damaged copy of the Gospel of Mary (discovered in the late 19th century but probably originally written in the 2nd) that says "Jesus loved Mary and frequently kissed her on [lacuna]." Some have inferred that this hole in the text might have contained the words "the mouth" or “the lips.” But that is, itself, entirely supposition – and it is a huge leap from there to infer that she ultimately bore Jesus’ child! Likewise, nothing more is known of Joseph of Arimathea beyond what is said in the Gospels (he is mentioned in all four), i.e., that he was a wealthy member of the Sanhedrin and at least an admirer, if not follower, of Jesus who petitioned Pilate for the body to provide a proper burial. Assuming these details about this Joseph are accurate, he would have been older and well-established in 1st century Palestine; thus, it is more than a little far-fetched to think he could have ended up 2,000 miles away at the opposite end of the known world in what was then barbarian England.

The premise that the kind of Middle Ages type church depicted in this movie could have been built in 1st century England is just plain absurd.

I've often wondered about verses from the hymn Jerusalem:

And did those feet in ancient time
Walk upon England's mountains green?
And was the holy Lamb of God
On England's pleasant pastures seen?
And did the Countenance Divine
Shine forth upon our clouded hills?
And was Jerusalem builded here
Among those dark Satanic mills?

The poem, by William Blake, was inspired by the apocryphal story that a young Jesus, accompanied by his uncle Joseph of Arimathea, travelled to England and visited Glastonbury.

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/And_did_those_feet_in_ancient_time)

Yup, go talk to people around Glastonbury or elsewhere in England to people that know Glastonbury. There are folk tales, legends, and written works about Joseph of Arimathea that have been around long before "the DaVinci Code" (2003)or even the way more scholarly work "Holy Blood, Holy Grail" (1982) from which Dan Brown took his material.

"Holy Blood, Holy Grail" is, by the way, the book with which one should take issue instead of Dan Brown's, as he never claimed DVC to be other than fiction. But HBHG's publication in 1982 had aroused such a furor that i was surprised when it was all revisited 19 years later. Anyway, that book claimed to be fact, and i don't think "ALL reputable scholars" (except maybe all "christian" ones, who have a vested interest in promoting disbelief of the research) have discredited the research entirely.

Of course, the retelling of these tales may be partly in service of the tourist industry in the west of England, but they were around when i lived in England in the 1970s.