When I first heard about National Treasure: Book of Secrets, I’ll admit that I was optimistic, even giddy. While Nicholas Cage gets more hit-or-miss with each passing year and the biggest of the Hollywood blockbusters are often the biggest of disappointments, I have to put down my jaded critic’s glasses and believe that not every sequel is a cash-in and that every movie has a chance for greatness.
Sadly, this joins the ranks of Shrek The Third, Spider-Man 3, Live Free or Die Hard and Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer for 2007’s list of movies I really, really wish hadn’t been made.
Conceptually speaking, however, the film sounds like the perfect sequel to the first film, encompassing all the world-tripping and treasure hunting fun of the original. Ben Gates (Nicholas Cage), famed treasure hunter, goes on a quest to find out the truth behind the assassination of Abraham Lincoln when black market dealer Mitch Wilkinson (Ed Harris) shows the world supposed proof that Gates’ great-great-grandfather was involved in the murder of the beloved president.
The rest of the cast from the previous film joined Gates and along the way is forced to locate the Book of Secrets, a book owned by each president of the United States, which contains all the nation’s secrets ranging from Area 51 to the Kennedy assassination and so on.
While I love the idea of treasure hunting and the Book of Secrets, as it adds a little magic to our nation’s history that feels somewhat missing the last few years, it plays very little role in the film, mainly feeling like a plot device to get them on another point-A to point-B adventure. An earlier Nicholas Cage film, The Rock, turned the mystery of the Kennedy assassination and Roswell into a wonderful little surprise that bites you in the rear at the end of the film, but here the national conspiracy is simply fluff.
My next issue is the sheer scope of Gates’ conviction to clear the name of his great-great-grandfather. Maybe it’s America’s nature as a mass melting pot, or maybe it’s just me, but I don’t feel responsible to defend a man 150 years dead who shared a cluster of chromosomes and blood in common with myself. I take the pursuit even less seriously when Gates’ only real public repercussion come in the form of an argument with a nerdy 11-year-old during an Easter egg roll.
Finally Ed Harris, a four-time Academy-nominated actor who has consistently impressed me in everything from A Beautiful Mind to History of Violence, feels so wasted as the villain of this film. His goals are never all that clear and his motivations feel all over the place, at one point beating up Gates’ father in the old man’s home, at another point declaring the glory of the Wilkinson family, then saying he needs Gates’ help, then having assassins sent after Gates, then kidnapping, and then back again. What the hell is this guy after? At least in the last film Sean Bean’s villain had understandable goals. He wanted to be rich and famous. That’s it.
The performances are nothing to write home about either, and director John Turtletaub seemed to be OK with throwing out things like comedic timing and clever dialogue. Turtletaub’s work on the first National Treasure and the TV series Jericho had let me forget about some of his more childish and puerile films like 3 Ninjas and The Kid, but his kiddy Disney film roots all come rushing back to me here.
I realize people in Hollywood will do most things for a fat check, but this is just too big a waste of good talent for my tastes. Wait for the movie to hit the cheap theatres and either turn your brain off before the curtain goes up or see something else.
