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National Treasure
EMAILPRINTBuena Vista Pictures
Generally unfavorable reviews
Based on 35 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 112 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie >
Movie Info
Genre(s): Action | Adventure
Written by:
Cormac Wibberley
Marianne Wibberley
Jim Kouf
Directed by: Jon Turteltaub
Release Date:
Theatrical: November 19, 2004
DVD: May 3, 2005
Running Time: 100 minutes, Color
Origin: USA
Summary
RATING: PG for action violence and some scary images
Starring Nicolas Cage, Harvey Keitel, Jon Voight, Diane Kruger, Sean Bean, Justin Bartha, David Dayan Fisher, and Christopher Plummer
Nicholas Cage stars as the brilliant treasure hunter Benjamin Franklin Gates in who discovers a secret from our nation's past that will lead to the greatest adventure in history. (Disney)
Also On Metacritic
FILM: Instinct National Treasure: Book of Secrets The Kid
Also On The Web: Internet Movie Database View The Trailer Official Studio Site
What The Critics Said
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
Chicago Tribune Allison Benedikt
Overall the film is alluringly over-the-top without being overcooked.
Read Full Review >Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman
The film whirls by in a satisfying torrent of chases, escapes and discoveries.
Read Full Review >Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow
A wholesome, headlong extravaganza - a sort of North by Northeast sans high style and erotic innuendo.
Read Full Review >Washington Post Stephen Hunter
Cleverness can be overrated but it can be underrated too, and the best thing about National Treasure is how clever it is.
Read Full Review >Boston Globe Wesley Morris
National Treasure even has a rough time approaching the heart of ''The Amazing Race," a show that manages, in 44 minutes, to make you care about average folks as they follow clues across the globe.
Read Full Review >Miami Herald Peter Debruge
It's a tomb-raiding adventure movie several notches below Indiana Jones status.
Read Full Review >Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey
An undeniable pleasure of National Treasure was watching a movie shot locally that wasn't haunted by a virus or by dead people.
Read Full Review >The Hollywood Reporter Kirk Honeycutt
If you're going to tell a wildly implausible tale of fortune hunting and unlikely heroes, you could do worse than National Treasure.
Read Full Review >Chicago Reader J.R. Jones
It runs like a Swiss watch, though the plot continuously turns on Cage's liberal interpretation of ridiculously cryptic clues.
Read Full Review >San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle
It has no ambition, little sense and false sentiment, but it does have velocity, high spirits and scale.
Read Full Review >Variety Scott Foundas
Tries to combine the suspense of old Saturday morning serials with the gusto of producer Jerry Bruckheimer's action pics. Falling short on both counts, this long, and long-winded, series of middling cliffhangers won't pump the adrenaline of action aficionados or -- the family crowd.
Read Full Review >Los Angeles Times Carina Chocano
National Treasure is as doggedly hokey and ham-handed as a Disneyland ride.
Read Full Review >Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt
Too bad the clever bits are swamped by no-brainer gunfights, rescues, and chases galore.
Read Full Review >Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
National Treasure is so silly that the Monty Python version could use the same screenplay, line for line.
Read Full Review >The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Liam Lacey
Coming from writers responsible for such material as "Snow Dogs" and "The 6th Day," National Treasure is not so much a no-brainer as a brain-stunner, so audaciously ridiculous you are initially intrigued, then soon irritated by its incoherence.
Read Full Review >Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum
The character of a scruffy computer nerd, played with might-as-well-enjoy-myself charm by little-known actor Justin Bartha, steals the picture from glossier players.
Read Full Review >Village Voice Ed Park
Ham-handed to start, with a fondness for cochlea-crushing decibel levels, National Treasure gets more entertaining as the preposterousness rises.
Read Full Review >LA Weekly Robert Abele
Can't match an ounce of the suspense generated by contestants frantically buying airline tickets on Bruckheimer's own TV money quest, "The Amazing Race." This movie is a fortune wasted.
Read Full Review >Portland Oregonian M. E. Russell
Nicolas Cageologists will be sad to hear that he's entirely too normal in National Treasure -- he's mildly funny but doesn't make any of the kooky dramatic choices (needless accents, ranting about the orifices of Greek gods) that made his other Bruckheimer performances so much fun to watch.
Read Full Review >Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek
Jon Voight shows up as Ben's daddy, and Harvey Keitel plays a devilishly goateed FBI agent: They're the only two actors who seem to have a sense of how ridiculous National Treasure is, but there's not enough of them to carry the picture.
Read Full Review >Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold
Too dumb and improbable to even go into.
Read Full Review >USA Today Mike Clark
Ten minutes into the picture, you're searching the screen for life-support machines.
Read Full Review >New York Daily News Jami Bernard
If the Founding Fathers had known National Treasure would be the result of their efforts to forge a new nation, they might have reached for the Wite-Out.
Read Full Review >Premiere Aaron Hillis
For his fourth paycheck-cashing run through “J-Bruck’s” action-hero gauntlet, Cage lazily plays Benjamin Franklin Gates-the first of many overstuffed social-studies references.
Read Full Review >ReelViews James Berardinelli
National Treasure's storyline isn't compelling or coherent enough to warrant the term "plot."
Read Full Review >The Onion (A.V. Club) Nathan Rabin
It lacks the conviction to embrace its own garish awfulness, resulting in little more than tedious historical and patriotic hokum, a preposterous potboiler done in by slack pacing and pedestrian execution.
Read Full Review >Washington Post Michael O'Sullivan
Rated PG, which must stand for "particularly gullible," it's "Raiders of the Lost Ark" for people who slept through American history class.
Read Full Review >Rolling Stone Peter Travers
It's not just hard to believe any of this, it's impossible. And director Jon Turteltaub (Phenomenom) directs with robotic cheerlessness.
Read Full Review >Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern
Disney's National Treasure is supposed to be family-friendly, a PG-rated action adventure free of hard violence and bad language. That's admirable, to be sure, but with a friend like this a family doesn't need sleeping pills.
The New York Times Stephen Holden
If National Treasure mattered at all, you might call it a national disgrace, but this piece of flotsam is so inconsequential that it amounts to little more than a piece of Hollywood accounting.
Read Full Review >Dallas Observer Robert Wilonsky
Isn't any fun at all, which is ultimately the most damning thing you can say about a Bruckheimer movie.
Read Full Review >What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this movie is 7.1 (out of 10) based on 112 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
John H. gave it a9:
An excellent film. Great acting, action, etc. This movie is very believable and appealing to both adults and kids. I loved it. I will never be able to figure out why so many people hate the film, because I thought it was out standing, unlike the sequel. See this movie!
Gorg gave it a10:
Fantastic movie. Screw the critics.
skinny s. gave it an8:
The first thing that I liked about this movie is that it starts out mysterious. I like these types of movies because it leaves me thinking and is not boring. The second thing that I liked about this movie is that things like clues lead to other things and it keeps you guessing. I did this throughout the whole movie. I had to watch it twice just to get it better.
Jack B gave it a7:
I watched this film to follow a genre that seems to have been lost in Hollywood over recent years, adventure. Its exactly what I got and i thoroughly enjoyed it. There are probably many things wrong with this film but if you just want to relax for a couple of hours and take movie with a pinch of salt, then this film is great. Thoroughly enjoyable plot, good action sequences and a nice enough cast. All good fun.
[Anonymous] gave it an8:
Okay this is not Pirates, as I found out. It didn't have as much fun and excitement as Pirates. But it is a good movie. Screw the critics.
Erratic Communist gave it a10:
A light-hearted film with a great plot, which when combined with its revenue becomes another example of "Don't trust the critics". But judging by the "average rating" I guess that any film that doesn't have end of the world scenes or over-the-top violence in it is deemed inferior today.
William T gave it a7:
Not the best Disney (or general) film ever, but still pretty darn good for my tastes.
