JERRY BRUCKHEIMER - MOVIE REVIEWS: NATIONAL TREASURE: BOOK OF SECRETS

MOVIE REVIEWS: NATIONAL TREASURE: BOOK OF SECRETS

Jerry Bruckheimer's National Treasure: Book of Secrets is certainly not regarded as any treasure by most critics, but then the name Jerry Bruckheimer in the credits probably makes the film critic-proof. That's something that several critics themselves acknowledge. Writes Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun-Times: "The person who attends National Treasure: Book of Secrets expecting logic and plausibility is on a fool's mission. This is a Mouth Agape Movie, during which your mouth hangs open in astonishment at one preposterous event after another." Steven Rea in the Philadelphia Inquirer simply dismisses it as "a thumping, gabby slog." Kyle Smith in the New York Post, writes that it's another epic thriller in which all the stars SHOUT a lot. "You may think you've already seen RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK, but you haven't seen anything until you've seen it remade in GLORIOUS MORONORAMA," he remarks. Ann Hornaday in the Washington Post notes, "This is, after all, a film that shows the sign outside the J. Edgar Hoover FBI Building, then self-importantly types out the same words at the bottom of the screen." However, she adds, "if viewers can overlook some of the more blatant dumb-isms, Book of Secrets provides its own good-natured brand of pulp pleasure" Claudia Puig in USA Today thinks it's all calculated by Bruckheimer, who, she says, has "cleverly hit on a hit formula: old-fashioned entertainment with modern production values and underlying themes of patriotism and family loyalty." Peter Hartlaub in the San Francisco Chronicle makes a similar point when he notes, "everyone involved with the movie seems completely aware of the ridiculousness and embraces it with little jokes and other nods."

21/12/2007