Nicolas Cage is having something of a moment. His newest film, the acclaimed The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent, is something of a meta-commentary on the actor’s gonzo career of acting in genuine masterpieces, high-concept action films and straight-to-video garbage. It seems an apt time to return to one of his works; why not select one of the two films where he plays Benjamin Franklin Gates, as that is his most financially lucrative role.
National Treasure: Book of Secrets is the sequel to National Treasure and reprises the earlier film’s plot architecture: Cage as Gates is a patriotic history buff off on a wild treasure hunt whose parameters are hinted at in arcane “clues” hiding in plain sight in the most cherished artifacts of US-American life. Here, in the sequel, Gates is deciphering a long-lost, now-found page of John Wilkes Booth’s personal diary that both suggests Gates’ own ancestors played a role in the plot to assassinate Lincoln and hints at a primordial treasure stowed away in some secret compartment somewhere in the United States (no spoilers here on which literally iconic location that happens to be). The film, then, has Gates traipse all over Europe and the US to restore the “honor” of his family name and also find the secret treasure.
This is a kid’s movie, so it seems unfair to challenge the plot logistics: everyone is entirely credulous about most things, the president is “kidnapped” (sort of) during a speech at Mount Vernon, of all places, after Gates lures him into searching for a hidden passage and Gates seems to have little trouble getting to Paris, London and all over the US, even while carrying out supposedly illegal acts. There is, however, one scene in Paris that goes too far: Gates progresses the treasure hunt forward by deciphering an obscure clue written into a replica of the Statue of Liberty by going through a half dozen ridiculous leaps of logic on the flimsiest of evidence and somehow deduces the right answer.
But one expects procedural issues to be yada-yada’d out of the way in a film for children. No, the truly unshakeable realization when watching National Treasure: Book of Secrets in the year 2022 is that all of the characters are white. This is a film about US history and about discovering an “ancient” Native American treasure. Yet there is not a single Black person, Hispanic person or Native American among the prominent cast (one Black man does get a bit part). If this film were made today, there would be much greater racial representation among the cast, especially given that the presence of people of color in US society is literally foundational to the plot.
This observation about National Treasure: Book of Secrets leads to the other glaringly obvious feature that sticks out to the viewer in 2022: namely, how old-fashioned the values championed by the film are. Neither Gates nor the antagonist of the film, Ed Harris’ Mitch Wilkinson, is animated to locate the treasure for reasons of greed. No, Gates wants to prove the innocence of his ancestor and Wilkinson to have his family’s name go down in history for something worthwhile. These are so far removed from contemporary values that you expect the Book of Secrets to shift to sepia tone with a piano soundtrack!
Another major plot point hinges on the fundamental respectability and prestige of the office of the US presidency; in 2007, when the film was made, this was actually a major talking point in broader US society as the president at that time, Dubya Bush, was widely reviled but respected because, you know, the presidency. But in 2022? After four years of “Grab ‘em by the pussy” Trump and going on two years of Weekend at Bernie’s Biden? No one today imbues the office of the presidency with prestige, seriousness or gravity. Only carnival barkers and catatonic idiots even want to be president. A final, more pernicious, old-fashioned value heralded in Book of Secrets is traditional marriage. Two divorces are reversed in the course of treasure hunt, with women moving back into the sort of roles that Disney had them play in the ‘60s.
National Treasure: Book of Secrets is not a bad film. It is even enjoyable in that batshit, Nic Cage-grabbing-a-quick-buck kind of way, if you can accept the fact that only straight white dudes get any shine in the film. But it is decidedly out of date, even after only 15 years.
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