National Treasure: Book of Secrets (2007) Reviews

• Decent film

  AllTheMountains2007-12-31

  National Treasure: Book of Secrets is a decent film. Nothing more, nothing less. I came out of the theater content, and yet by the next hour I'd forgotten much of what had taken place. Such is the case for most films now, however. Compared to the first film, the plot is weak (certainly not as tightly drawn as the former) but the energy is the same and the humor is the same, and overall it's still as watchable as the first. Helen Mirren and Ed Harris were also very good, and somewhat surprising, additions to the cast. Essentially, the movie is on the ridiculous/unbelievable side, but it's worth a watch. I don't think I'd pay another 10 dollars to see it again in theaters, but waiting for a rental will do.

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• Good entertainment

  good_dn2007-12-19

  I will keep it short and simple. Just watched it, paid 10$ for it, it is worth it. Not much of details as you would expect out of a great movie, not much of substance in the movie itself however the acting and the pace of the movie is so beautiful you wont think of the flaws in the intricate plans they carry out in the movie. The subtle comedy is really nice and they have kept the first movie in consideration and have not brought many new characters. It is not a movie that you would think a lot about after you come out of the hall, however you will not think anything else either while the movie is going on. I will give it 7 for the sheer value of entertainment and nothing else and of course the one liners that keep popping up which actually make you laugh.

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• Entertaining and Full of Action Adventure

  claudio_carvalho2010-01-13

  During a lecture about John Wilkes Booth and Thomas Gates, Ben Gates (Nicolas Cage) and his father Patrick Gates (Jon Voight) are surprised by Mitch Wilkinson (Ed Harris) that claims that their ancestor was a conspirator in the assassination of Abraham Lincoln based on the missing page of Booth's diary that he possesses. The outraged Ben decides to prove the honor of his ancestor and together with his wife Abigail (Diane Kruger) and his best friend, the writer Riley Poole (Justin Bartha), they head to France, England and Washington to collect clues to lead them to a lost city of gold Cinola and clean the name of Thomas Gates. But Mitch Wilkinson is following each step of Ben and his friends to take the merit of finding the treasure for himself. "National Treasure: Book of Secrets" is an entertaining and full of action adventure that follows the style of Indiana Jones combined with "Da Vinci Code. The story is developed in high pace, with likable characters and funny situations. Nicolas Cage and the gorgeous German Diane Kruger show a wonderful chemistry and Jon Voight, Justin Bartha and Helen Mirren give a magnificent support. Ed Harris is a very confused and ambiguous villain and his true motives are never clear, Harvey Keitel has a minor role and Bruce Greenwood performs again the role of president of the United States of America that seems to be tailored for this great actor. My vote is seven. Title (Brazil): "A Lenda do Tesouro Perdido – Livro dos Segredos" ("The Legend of the Lost Treasure – Book of Secrets")

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• Wait for the DVD in the WalMart $5 unsorted reject movie box.

  lowershore2007-12-23

  *****Spoiler Ahead STOP Now***** This was a classic case of sequel trying to live off the fervor of the original but had gone bad in horrible ways. So if you want to view this pathetic excuse for a movie stop reading now, go see it, then finish this slash and burn review. The movie speed was a dreadful snooze for many minutes at a time. I found myself actually more entertained looking around the theater to see if other people were doing the same. The story started out plausible and there may even be a tiniest shred of actual history to support the artistic privileges the story writers embarked on. Let me think.. Lincolns assassination and a letter from the French to the Confederate Union, 3 statues of Liberty, 2 identical desks (Oval office and in the Queens of England's Office), and Mount Rushmore _IS_ located in South Dakota and not in South America. I have a SERIOUS beef with this Disney Production on that last one. Everybody who watched this movie left there dumber than they entered. The gullible people out there probably think there is a lake on the top (or within walking distance of the top) of Mount Rushmore. Even WORSE people may actually believe that an ancient Mayan culture lived in South Dakota, built caverns, and then transported and lined them with tons of gold. Sure why not, it's a movie! The story leaped from Dad's house, to the Gates' mansion, to Paris, to London, to University of Maryland, to the White House, to a Presidential retreat, to the Library of Congress, to Mount Rushmore, to a Lake *on* Mount Rushmore... all seemingly in a span of a day or two. I guess it is technically possible to zip around the world like that but jet lag would have surely taken its toll... yet everybody seemed fine. The one place they did not get even remotely close to was South America. Hello! The major story line leaned heavily on the Mayan civilization. WTF? Seems the story writers (perhaps in response to the critics) wanted to liven up the snooze screen play so they injected a ridiculous car chase. Complete with self repairing cars, drifting sequences, bullets at point blank range that hit everything but the target, and my new favorite... using the red light camera to take a photo (then getting that photo back later) of Mayan writing at high speeds. Yeah... right. Ed Harris should have stayed out of this one. His performance mechanics were fine but the story writers simply didn't know what to do with him. Seemed as if the original plot had him doing more but huge chunks of character development were left on the cutting room floor.. well, we can hope that. This might have been the best the writers could have mustered. Abigale was useless. Oh, she had her 60 seconds of lines but that was about it. The story writers made a horribly obvious "fix" to the story using her. She just magically appeared in the right place (she was in the States earlier) and the right time without any coordination to help Benjamen sneak into the Queens office. Plausibility... Zero. Riley was cute and lovable as before. The writers tried overly hard to capitalize on this comedic charm. What the heck... he's pretty handy with an IPod and a laptop. Benjamen, as a positive role model for a _Disney_ film, should go to jail. Let's count the offenses: Speeding, reckless driving, theft, trespassing, destruction of property, conspiracy to kidnap, and kidnapping. Disney thinks this is all fine since he's the "hero" after all. Thanks Disney! I have no idea why the Feds were in this film. They didn't do anything until the very end... but that was only after Benjamen called them. The "book" was a pathetic story prop. They could have used a spoon or pile of play dough. If only the book had been used throughout the movie... Nope, that would take real story writing skills. Nitpicks... 1) I doubt "duplicated" cell phones really allow you to receive a call in two locations at once. 2) The story title "Book of Secrets" relates to a book that had a total of 30 seconds relevance (I am being generous here) to the whole story. 3) Cliché, the bad guys hijack ridiculous vehicles in a high speed chase. In this case a truck loaded with kegs of beer. 4) Security in the Queens Office seems laughable. Just walk in, take what you want and walk out. 5) Riley can remotely unlock security gates and set off fire alarms from a restroom. Seems the Disney group has a low opinion of British security. 6) Riley also has super human strength. He picked up a block of gold and by the look of it should have been about 400lbs. 7) Cliché, "let's turn this spinner/lever thing and see what happens"... not once.. but 5 freaking times.... yawn. 8) Hey.. didn't they have one of those rolling doors in Indiana Jones? 9) Oh sh*t we're all going to drown... panic!!! Let's all go to the lowest point in this crisis and speed up the drownings. What's that? A glimpse of sunlight from above? How about treading water until things fill up so you can walk out. Nope can't do that. Got to have another unnecessary plot complication to wipe out the useless bad guy. Summing up. The "National Treasure: Book of Secrets" will join the ranks of sequel movie blunders. Story writers never made clear why chasing after this lost city of gold would prove that Gate's great great grandfather was not a Confederate collaborator. WTF is up with this lake on Rushmore and this Mayan culture. Generally, the story was fragmented, slow, clichés everywhere, gross leaps from plausibility, and a disgustingly irresponsible display of story telling by Disney.

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• Nonsense production for an audience without expectations.

  JWJanneck2007-12-26

  I had seen the previous National Treasure, and armed with that memory and the knowledge that this was a Disney movie, I watched its sequel without a great deal of expectations---predictable adventure drivel, Indiana Jones with more modern special effects, is what I expected. But this movie manages to disappoint even fairly modest expectations such as those. In the end it really comes down to two problems: (1) It doesn't make any sense. (2) The acting is awful. On (1), I really don't mean to nitpick on historical minutiae---hell, I'd be happy to suspend disbelief for two hours on stuff such as Lincoln's assassination, Mayan treasures, Mount Rushmore geography, and all that other nonsense. No problem there. But the point of a treasure hunt movie is the ability to follow the main character in his struggle, perhaps struggle with him, see him figure things out and perhaps guess with him. For this to work, the universe of the movie doesn't have to be consistent with the world we live in, but it has to be consistent with itself. But the universe of this movie is like a great big fairy tale, with the central character pulling white rabbits out of his sleeve whenever he needs them. Yes, the movie tries its hand at some drama, but it just doesn't work. Things go pretty smoothly for the most part---into the Queen's office, out of it again, oops, we are being chased, heck, let's take a photo, oh no camera, ah, there is a traffic camera, yep and by the way, can you just hack into the computer and download the pic, and on to the next event (same thing with the oval office, then kidnapping the president). While the hero thus McGyvers his way through an increasingly preposterous story, the whole thing just starts to feel stale, and you get the feeling that it might have been better if he had not stolen the Constitution in part 1, so the writers would not have to top this. The villain is lame and for the most part useless, not to speak of somewhat incoherent ("I am not going last, so I might as well go first"---say what?). None of the story really makes the slightest bit of sense, including the motivation of the hero (to clear the name of his great-great-grandfather---that's why he risks his life, the life of friends and loved ones, not to speak of his own good name by kidnapping a president!). It's all just a steaming pile of nonsense aimed at people who really do not give a damn about story and stuff, but who just want to see a lot of movement/action, high-tech gobbledygook, explosions, and cheap patriotism. However, as bad as the story was, (2), the bad acting was even worse. Everybody in this movie was disappointing, even a non-actor like Kruger. Her career should end with this movie, over, out, finito. She cannot do it, and it's not been for a lack of opportunity. If you had a consistent record of failure like hers in any regular job, you'd find yourself with a lot of spare time very soon. But even the real actors here just make you cringe---Greenwood, Harris, Mirren, Voight, they all deliver horrible performances that seem to betray their lack of passion and their paycheck mentality. We know they *can* act, we have seen it before, but they just don't in this movie. Keitel comes away without much harm---his part is so tiny, there just isn't a lot of opportunity to screw things up too badly. Why oh why do they keep making this fluff? Because for some reason we attend it. We go there, drop our cash, and watch this nonsense. I am guilty as charged. But if you haven't seen it, you and your money can still make a difference. Watch a good movie. There are plenty out there.

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