National Treasure - Book of Secrets - C+

In theaters. Rated PG, 124 minutes. Trailer.

A true nerd at heart, I've always been a sucker for treasure hunt movies, especially those with an "historic" angle. After enjoying the first National Treasure, I decided, in spite of the long running time, to venture into the sequel. The old gang is back, led by an oddly coifed Nicolas Cage and generic Jon Voight. Same exact formula, not quite as good of a result. Click below for the rest of the review.

The film opens with Cage and Voight presenting evidence that their great-grandfather, Thomas, should be included in a Civil War heroes exhibit, only to be refuted by the non-maimed twin brother of Ed Harris' character in the History of Violence. Harris produces an original missing page from the John Wilkes Boothe diary that seemingly shows the deceased Gates to have been the mastermind of the Lincoln assassination. Cage claims Thomas was trying to stop the Golden Knights of the Confederacy from finding Cibola, the lost City of Gold, and burned the page, while Harris claims he was behind the assassination. So, Nicolas is 'forced' to clear Thomas' (and his) good name by finding the treasure. Of course, Harris is a latent member of the GKC and is trying to trap Gates into leading him to the treasure and doing all the hard work on the way.

The first 2/3 of the film are enjoyable and tightly paced. The last third borders on self-parody, though, as each turn in a cave brings yet another 'could the indians have really built that?' moment for the audience. The best parts of the film are Justin Bartha as underappreciated Cage sidekick Riley Poole and Bruce Greenwood as the President of the United States (he was also great in I'm Not There as an unrelenting BBC journalist), not to mention Diane Kruger. The worst parts are all of Jon Voight, Helen Mirren and Ed Harris' character's lines and stories, not to mention the massive leaps the audience is asked to take to make the plot stick. The Queen must've cringed hard at this script as her follow-up to winning last year's best actress award.

Viewing note: Showing started at an AMC theater at 7:30. Actual movie didn't start until 7:56, because of previews for every bad movie coming out this Spring, and a 10 minutes Goofy cartoon about tv's and installing them.....seriously. Not a commercial, no point, no relation to the movie, just me watching 10 minutes of Goofy. Why did Disney do that to us? I got some weird looks and a sharp elbow from the wife when I audibly booed at the end of it. I have nothing against Goofy, but I don't appreciate my time being taken without reason.