National Treasure

Or the movie that should've ended Nicolas Cage's career, but didn't.

National Treasure is all kinds of horrible.  I'll get to the details, but first, let's see if this sounds familiar:

An ancient secret society hides a series of cryptic clues in plain view in places of great historical importance that would lead the most discerning individuals to find a great historical treasure.  There's some seedy characters who are out for the treasure for their own selfish reasons, so it's up to a protagonist with near encyclopedic knowledge of ancient history to solve the riddles and discern the clues that will lead him to the treasure first.  Along the way he meets an impossibly hot female professional who he inevitably hooks up with romantically.

That's right, it's like the plot of a bad dan brown novel!

Now i know what you're thinking: "a bad dan brown novel"?  Surely you jest!  That would imply there are "good" dan brown novels.

Of course, this is no coincidence.  National Treasure was released at the end of 2004, a year after Dan Brown's successful The Da Vinci Code (4 years after Angels and Demons), and it makes no mistake that it is blantantly ripping off the plot, but with the backdrop of the US instead of Europe.  I guess Disney felt that using a European setting would be too similar.  Either that or they felt average americans would be too stupid to accept a setting outside the United States.

Interestingly enough, a lot of the same "ancient masonic mysteries" appear in National Treasure as in The Lost Symbol.  One might cynically think this a case of the plagiarised ripping off the plagiariser, but i think it's probably more likely that they're both borrowing heavily from the same mythos.

But enough preamble, let's run down the plot in a little more detail.  I know i'm breaking my cardinal sin of "not spoiling" here, but screw it.  If it's good enough for other reviewers to spoil movies, it's good enough for me.  Besides, the movie's terrible anyway, so i'm doing you a favour.

SPOILER TIME

Nicolas Cage plays an unlikeable man-child that believes himself to be an honset-to-goodness Knight(s Templar) and has tasked himself with finding and protecting the hidden Masonic treasure of the title.  After following a clue given to him by his grandfather decades ago, Cage, with the help of a wealth financier (Sean Bean), manages to track down a clue that eventually points him to a map written on the Declaration of Independence.

Because Cage and his comedy relief side-kick (Justin Bartha) are good guys, they immediately conclude it's impossible to follow the trail since it would require getting their hands on the actual Declaration of Independence.  A movie, however, needs conflict, so Bean decides he's going to steal it anyway.  Cage of course swears he'll stop him from committing such a crime, thereby quing the forced conflict of the movie.  Bean does the usual villain rant "if you're not with me, you're expendable" and we're treated to a rather pointless firefight.  Why?  Why not just lie to Cage about stealing the Declaration of Independence and go about scheming behind his back anyway?

Anyway, things go from bad to worse as Cage discovers no one believes his warnings that someone is going steal the Declaration of Independence.  Cage, being the "stand up" guy that he is, decides the only way to keep the Declaration of Independence from being stolen is to... wait for it... steal the Declaration of Independence.  Of course, once he's done this, he views it as his duty as a "responsible citizen" to follow the map and find the masonic treasure himself.

All this, of course, makes the primary conflict now look silly since both the good guys and bad guys have identical goals and methods, with the only real defining characteristic being that Bean and his men were quick to get violent.

Oh well? ...

Of course, in the process of stealing the Declaration of Independence, Cage and Bartha end up accidentally kidnapping Dr Abigail Chase (Diane Kruger), who is the head of the National Archives and protector of the document, while trying to evade Bean and his men.  Kruger wastes no time in whining like a child for Cage to give back the Declaration of Independence, prompting Bartha, wise man that he is, to remind Cage of the duct tape in the back of the van.

Sadly, this being a Disney movie ("for the kids!" and all that) and the strict laws requiring a sideline love story in movies overrule Bartha's better judgment, so Cage turns down this suggestion and Kruger instantly becomes a willing party and love interest without a single word more of protest.

Lazy story writing makes baby jesus cry!

Now that the writers have painfully beaten their way to the point of the story they wanted to start at to begin with, it's time for the protagonists to actually get some "treasure findin'" done - that is, by interpreting the clues and discerning the puzzles.  To do this, the characters take turns playing stupid just so they can explain the clues to the audience and presumably each other.

After some improbably plot twists and action sequences, including a firefight in the streets that attracts the attention of no one, the Declaration of Independence and some other MacGuffin's land in the possession of the badguys and the plot finds the good guys and bad guys working together once again.  While at first it seems almost consensual, it turns out that the badguys have also taken to kidnapping and have abducted Cage's father (Jon Voight) to use as a bargaining chip to force Cage's compliance.

Of course, why they really need Cage's help when they have all the clues themselves is a mystery.  The writers handwave it as being "Cage knows more about history" and can more readily discern the clues.  A stretch, to be sure, as the bad guys seemed to have done just fine keeping up the chase, even snubbing the FBI (no, really) and evading the police without holding any of the MacGuffin's themselves.

Anyway, with Cage's help, the group finally manage to trace the clues to an underground crypt, but run into a dead end.  Bean is convinced that it's not a dead end and manages to threaten one last clue out of Cage and the other good guys before leaving them to die in the catacombs, along with the Declaration of Independence and all the other MacGuffin's they've collected, since he apparently no longer needs them.

Bartha moans for a bit about dying, but as it turns out, Cage had given Bean a fake clue to get rid of him while the real treasure was actually right under their noses.  Cage and company find the treasure, contact the police and return the Declaration of Independence.

End of story, right?  Well, there's still all that uncomfortable bit of "stealing the Declaration of Independence" and "resisting arrest" and the like.  So, what does Cage do?  Why, bribe the FBI agent, of course (he even says so in the movie)!  He gives the treasure to various museums with a number of conditions, ranging from giving credit to his colleagues to avoiding jail for himself.

It's revealed that the agent is a high ranking Freemason and he accepts the bribe, provided someone else goes to jail in Cage's stead.  Bean takes the fall, Cage and Kruger get married and everyone lives happily ever after.  The ending is just as cliched and ripped off as the rest of the movie, though arguably in a different sort of way.

By the way, just for the record, here's the breakdown:

Good Guys: breaking and entering, stealing, kidnapping, resisting arrest and bribing an officer of the law.
Bad Guys: breaking and entering, attempted stealing, kidnapping, resisting arrest and attempted murder.
Motivation for both: finding a treasure for personal gain.

So yeah, i guess the bad guys are worse than the good guys, but it's a close call.

Well, that's National Treasure.  It looks, feels and plays out like a Dan Brown-esque adventure, but with the notable exception of being up front about it's factual inaccuracies.  Unfortunately, it's not a particularly good adventure movie and the flaws against it are numerous: the plot is forced, the suspense feels fake, the characters are not particularly clever or endearing and the story is childish.  Also, it stars Nicolas Cage.

I've heard other reviewers citing this movie as a fun ride if you can get past the inplausibility, but i think that's a stretch.  After all, any movie, no matter how horrible, can be a "fun ride" if you can get past its flaws.  Well, maybe not any movie... *cough*Observe and Report*cough*.

Over all, i give this movie 2.5 of Dan Brown's books out of 5: D.