"The greatest adventure history has ever revealed."

National Treasure (2004): 7/10

Poster (c) Buena Vista Pictures

Dontcha just hate Jerry Bruckheimer? I mean, Pearl Harbor sucked (and I miss you), and all of his movies are basically the same. It's a bunch of explosions, some stock characters, and a cheesy romance thrown in. National Treasure is no different. Then what sets this apart from all of Bruckheimer's other movies? The movie knows its absurd, knows its implausible and ultimately stupid, meaning that it can throw any reason out the window and alloy for some silly fun to overrule the movie. I can't regard anyone who calls this movie great as someone serious, but I also can't really see how someone could wave off this movie as being too light-hearted and can't enjoy the film for being the silly stupidity that it is.

Benjamin Franklin Gates (Nicolas Cage) descends from a long line of treasure hunters, looking for a treasure supposedly buried by the founding fathers. Generations before him have also looked, but to no avail. However, Ben, along with his wisecracking sidekicks/computer nerd Riley (Justin Bartha), find clues, while competing treasure hunter Ian (Sean Bean) follows close behind. Abigail Chase (Diane Kruger of Troy and Wicker Park fame), as some sort of historical government official, comes along for the ride.

As this is a Bruckheimer movie, I was expecting many forays into deep, dark tunnels with magical effects that almost (but don't) kill the main characters. Thankfully, that's only at the end; the majority of the movie's about stealing a priceless historical document. What could be cooler, really? If you think about it, it's completely against what we're supposed to be feeling, yet this all-American person decides to steal what's the backbone of our society for his own personal good. I mean, that's cool. The movie introduces many things that have no explanation (Benjamin Franklin's glasses, perchance?), have no reason why they could work, much like many other action/adventure movies. But, really, why care? The movie's entertaining. The action's there, the suspension of disbelief is there, and the fun's there.

I'm not a huge Nicolas Cage fan (but I don't really detest him like some do), but he's fine here. I mean, he's not a tremendous actor, but you could do worse. Bean and Kruger (both, actually, were in Troy-you could do six degrees of Troy easily) were as expected. Bean usually plays the "conniving evil British dude" in movies like these, and Kruger is at least making a mainstream name for herself. Bartha could quite possibly be the next guy who, when you see him in a movie, say "I KNOW that guy, I just don't know what else I saw him in." But, the acting's not important, what's important is that National Treasure is a fun movie. It has the stamp of Bruckheimer all over it, but don't let that fool you.

Rated PG for action violence and some scary images.

Review Date: December 3, 2004