National Treasure 3 Is Finally Happening — And Nicolas Cage Is Coming Back

Fans who attended a live recording of the National Treasure Hunt podcast on August 21 got far more than the retrospective conversation they probably expected.

Turteltaub used the event to publicly reveal that National Treasure 3 is moving forward.

He described the project as “finally real”, although he was careful to qualify that as being “Hollywood real” — in other words, it's genuinely progressing, but nothing in the movie business is guaranteed until cameras actually start rolling.

The biggest difference between this update and many of the reports we've heard over the years is the screenplay.

Turteltaub says they finally have a script he likes, and Disney's reaction was essentially that it sounds like a movie the studio can make.

That's considerably more substantial than simply having a third film sitting somewhere on a development slate.

This is where it's worth separating what we know from what we desperately want to be true.

Turteltaub said the plan is to bring back the original team, adding, “to whatever extent we can, everyone's back.”

That obviously puts Nicolas Cage's Benjamin Franklin Gates at the centre of expectations for the sequel, and several reports have subsequently described Cage as returning.

But at the time of writing, Disney or Cage hasn't made a separate formal announcement confirming he's signed a deal. Variety reported that representatives for both had not responded to requests for comment.

So the exciting version is: the filmmakers intend to get Ben Gates back.

The responsible version is: we're not calling Cage officially signed until Disney or Cage does.

And frankly, imagining a National Treasure movie without Nicolas Cage feels a little like making Indiana Jones without Indiana Jones.

The original National Treasure arrived in 2004 and turned American history into an enormously entertaining old-fashioned adventure movie.

Benjamin Gates became convinced that a clue to an enormous hidden treasure could be found on the Declaration of Independence, resulting in the sort of wonderfully ridiculous premise only a movie like this could pull off: Nicolas Cage had to steal one of the most important documents in American history in order to save it.

Audiences embraced it.

The first film earned approximately $347 million worldwide, and the 2007 sequel, National Treasure: Book of Secrets, went even bigger, finishing with roughly $459 million globally.

Normally, those numbers would make a third instalment almost inevitable.

Instead, the franchise effectively disappeared from cinemas.

And that's why this week's announcement matters so much. Fans haven't been waiting four or five years for another sequel.

They've been waiting nineteen.

There's also one particularly irritating piece of unfinished business.

Book of Secrets ends with the President directing Ben Gates towards Page 47 of the President's secret book.

Whatever Gates discovers there is apparently significant enough for him to describe it as life-altering — and then the credits roll.

That was in 2007.

Fans have therefore had nearly two decades to speculate about what Page 47 actually contains.

The new reports haven't revealed the plot of National Treasure 3, so there's currently no confirmation that the mystery will finally be resolved. Entertainment Weekly notes that the contents of Page 47 have long been a question surrounding the franchise.

But if you're bringing Benjamin Gates back after all this time, you can't leave that page sitting there forever.

Can you?

As exciting as this development is, we're still relatively early in the process.

There is currently no announced release date, filming start or complete cast.

Turteltaub's own description of the project as “Hollywood real” is probably the best way of looking at it. There's genuine momentum behind the movie and, crucially, a screenplay that has cleared an important creative hurdle with Disney — but there are still plenty of things that need to happen before we're buying cinema tickets.

That's why we're resisting the temptation to tell you that National Treasure 3 is definitely arriving in 2027, 2028 or any other year.

Nobody has announced that yet.

What we can say is that this appears to be the strongest position the third movie has occupied in years.

There's something rather refreshing about the prospect of National Treasure returning.

The first two movies came from an era when a huge studio adventure didn't necessarily need superheroes, a cinematic universe or ten hours of homework before you walked into the cinema.

You needed Nicolas Cage.

You needed a centuries-old conspiracy.

You needed an implausibly complicated clue hidden somewhere it absolutely shouldn't be.

And preferably you needed Ben Gates explaining American history at tremendous speed while somebody chased him.

That's National Treasure.

More importantly, almost two decades have passed since we last saw these characters. A third movie doesn't need to pretend that hasn't happened. An older Ben Gates returning to a world that's changed dramatically since 2007 could be exactly what makes the sequel interesting, not just nostalgic.

For now, though, there's finally something National Treasure fans haven't had for a very long time.

A third movie that genuinely appears to be moving.

And somewhere, Page 47 is waiting.