My Favourite Movies: National Treasure

Nick Cage plays Ben Gates in this historical romp and hysterical treasure hunt/chase movie. The Gates family came into part of a secret through accident that leads, so generations have thought, to a treasure beyond measure. Only Ben has yet to give up the dream. His initial team mate, played rather badly by Sean Bean, clearly is more interested in the money that the treasure and the fact that they need to steal the Declaration of Independence doesn’t faze him at all. So begins a parallel chase and puzzle solving race to unearth clues and find the treasure. As they race across New England the FBI are also on Gate’s tail for conspiracy, theft and the kidnapping of the beautiful curator of the museum he robbed.

This is beyond a doubt a very silly movie. The trick, however, is to keep the audience in a state of breathlessness as clue follows on clue and chase follows chase. This film literally doesn’t stop. This film is also dripping with patriotism, but (rather strangely) the irritation level is very low because the information is presented in small bite sized pieces and with a heavy does of humour. It’s like a history lesson given by a teacher who, from time to time cracks a joke or simply winks at his audience as he continues to educate them. I suppose that this film is one of my guilty pleasures. It’s a film that I really shouldn’t like. But I do – a lot. I did however hate the sequel with a deep passion. It had none of the ‘originality’ of the first movie and was without any sense of fun. National Treasure is a film fully aware of what it is and does not try to be anything else than a tongue in cheek adventure movie that knows exactly what its doing and is not afraid to let the audience know it knows what its doing. That, I think, is the selling point for me. I love it and I’m not ashamed to say so.