Susan Granger’s review of “National Treasure: Book of Secrets” (Walt Disney)
This sequel to the immensely popular “National Treasure” finds Ben Gates (Nicolas Cage) and his father Patrick (Jon Voight) on another archeological quest to unearth hidden history when a missing page from the diary of John Wilkes Booth implicates Ben’s great-great grandfather, Thomas Gates, in the assassination of Abraham Lincoln.
Determined to prove his ancestor’s innocence, Ben embarks on a treasure hunt that leads him to Paris (inspecting a second Statue of Liberty near the Eiffel Tower), London (infiltrating the Queen’s Study in Buckingham Palace) and back to Washington, D.C. (exploring the Oval Office for clues), where he kidnaps the President (Bruce Greenwood) during a White House dinner at Mt. Vernon to plead for a peek at the appropriately named Book of Secrets. That’s when he discovers that somewhere in the Black Hills of South Dakota, near Mount Rushmore, is the entrance to the fabled Cibola, a pre-Columbian City of Gold.
Joining Ben and his dad are his estranged girlfriend, archivist Abigail Chase (Diane Kruger), and his scholarly mother, Emily (Helen Mirren), an expert in archaic languages who broke up with his dad 32 years ago, plus their techno-nerd sidekick, Riley (Justin Bartha). Their adversary is Confederate sympathizer Mitch Wilkinson (Ed Harris), who has problems with his own family legacy. Plus, there’s a suspiciously well-informed FBI man (Harvey Keitel) on their trail.
Written by Cormac and Marianne Wibberley, directed by Jon Turtletaub and produced by Jerry Bruckheimer, it continues the whodunit/where-is-it/what-does-it mean formula. It’s a picturesque, minor-league Indiana Jones romp, filled with arcane information – and adding spunky Helen Mirren to re-kindle an old flame is a humorous touch. On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “National Treasure: Book of Secrets” is a fun-filled 7, chock-full-of-historical trivia.
