Patriotic and stereotyped...

Rating: 2/10 (15 September 2008)

Viewing this as an English girl is most likely a completely different viewing experience to any American watching this film. starting with the typecasting of the English villain (sean bean), and continuing with the nauseatingly patriotic tone and general anti-englishness throughout (sorry, "britishness") (i.e. the fact that the enemy is actually designated throughout as the British, and at the end they don't even consider the British museum as a possible site for the treasure), I found this film terrible. The historical inaccuracies are laughable throughout and I felt like hitting Nicholas Cage every time he said the "declaration of independence", which, whilst I respect the declaration as an important historical document, its NOT the most important document in the whole world (how about the magna carta? Rosetta stone? dead sea scrolls???), I found myself almost hoping that they would lose it. The dialog is heavy handed throughout, and Cage's leaps of logic are quite astounding, especially considering the the Knights Templar aren't really related in any way to the Freemasons, who are throughout the world, including in england, so why would the treasure be hidden from the British if there were British Freemasons? Overall, as a movie to laugh at, and a pleasant way to spend a mindless few hours, if you can ignore the numerous inaccuracies, I would recommend this film. As a serious insight into history, I would not.