Cheesy, silly but enjoyable 'Raiders' knock-off.

Rating: 6/10 (29 May 2008)

My Take: As over-the-top as it may be, this summer movie is enjoyable and actually not as idiotic as it might have been.
There's no doubt the plot of NATIONAL TREASURE is ludicrous and just plain silly, but who said it can't be fun? Although it's incredibly silly and the plot is mostly lifted from Dan Brown's THE DA VINCI CODE, it's still quite fun, and it really doesn't take itself way too seriously, so why should you? NATIONAL TREASURE probably knows it's dumb, if not, why shouldn't it? This is not the material that one should apply logic to. It is what it is, a silly dumb summer blockbuster. Check your brains at the door, grab a tub of popcorn and have a ball.
Nicolas Cage probably wanted to take a rest from the Oscars and plays a pedestrian role as obsessed explorer Ben Gates, who has spent much of his life in search of a treasure long been searched by his family legacy, as we were told by his grandfather (Christopher Plummer, in a cameo) at flashback during the beginning of the movie. For his whole life, Gates has not thought about anything else but to look for this treasure. Uh... hasn't anyone recommended this guy to get a job? Anyway, Gates search leads him to a series of mind-bending clues which, due to his expertise (or shall I say obsession) on history, he gets by them really quickly. His configurations are impressively clever, but when it comes to his solutions at the start, but the gets pretty overblown as it goes.
In fact, NATIONAL TREASURE isn't just full of these overblown plot twists, it's also filled with clichés and plot holes that almost built around the entire film. Whether it's clichés from recent action films, or clichés that date back to the old times where they eventually came from in the first place. This is, actually, an outmoded piece of old-fashioned escapism. But who said it can't be fun being that way? This is a mildly engaging, silly adventure film. It's old-fashioned to the extremes, and it doesn't have the same touches of greatness that fills the nostalgia of RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK, the film which this one obviously wanted to be, but it has it's neat touches and it is quite an efficient little action thriller. Silly, but silly fun just the same.
Rating: *** out of 5.