"The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent" star Nicolas Cage just disappointed fans with news that there won't be a third National Treasure movie — but the reason he gave made me an even bigger fan than ever.
It isn't like Cage hasn't made some genuinely awful movies. Even the best actors get stuck in the occasional stinker but Cage got himself into a financial mess so big he had to take every offer that came along — and he did. So for every bat-guano fantastic flick like "Mandy" or "Color Out of Space," there have been two or three "Ghost Riders" or "Wicker Mans."
"NOT THE BEES!" was not Cage's finest moment. If you saw "Ghost Rider" or — God help you — "Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance," then you know my condolences are not enough. Sadly, they are all I have to offer.
Full Disclosure: I've been a Cage fan since "Fast Times at Ridgemont High" and "Valley Girl" hit the rental shelves 40-plus years ago. I know what of what I speak.
On the flip side, the two National Treasure movies that came out in 2004 and 2007 rank among my favorite Cage flicks even if, as an actor, he didn't exactly need to stretch himself. But he was so good as the quirky and unexpected hero, Benjamin Franklin Gates, that the fun is infectious. Although maybe what I enjoyed most was how much reverence the first movie paid to the Declaration of Independence — even as Gates and his crew were stealing it from the National Archives.
Spoiler: They stole the Declaration for a good cause, I swear, and they returned it unharmed in the end.
There's a magic to those two movies, an old-fashioned and even patriotic sweetness to them, that has kept them in our regular rotation since they first hit home video. The production quality says "big-budget 21st Century action flick" but the characters and the storytelling could almost be mistaken for something out of Hollywood's golden age.
I'm not huge on never-ending franchises — don't get me started on why the Marvel movies should have taken a ten-year breather after "Avengers: Endgame" or we'll be here all day — so two National Treasure movies were all I ever needed. But if they should decide to make another one, I always figured I'd be there on opening weekend with a giant bucket of popcorn on my lap.
Cage isn't too old to pull off another starring role in a third film but there's just one problem: both movies were distributed by Disney-owned Buena Vista Pictures, which also holds the rights to the franchise.
This is how Nic Cage proved he's the Most Based Actor in Hollywood™.
In a recent interview with Screen Rant, Cage was asked about recent rumors that he might finally get a third go-round as Gates. He said, "Here we go! See, you're the one that brings these things up and they go out and they eclipse everything else. No, there is no National Treasure 3. If you want to find treasure, don't look at Disney, okay? It's not there."
The magic is not at Disney any longer.
But more importantly, the man who was willing to do totally forgettable dreck like 2015's "Pay The Ghost" just for the paycheck has so much respect for National Treasure that he won't take Disney money to make one that lacks the magic.
And that's why you should always respect Based Nic Cage, even on those lonely nights when you stumble across "Bangkok Dangerous" on streaming.
