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Tom sent me this article on The Cage's film choices:

Nicolas Cage, Aiming to Repeat History

By Ellen McCarthy
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, December 21, 2007; Page WE31

Perhaps you can't quite make up your mind about Nicolas Cage.

Serious, high-caliber actor? Or mainstream Hollywood hack?

It's okay. He can't decide either.

"I've noticed that I've really polarized my career into down-and-dirty dramas and Disney adventure fantasy pictures," the 43-year-old says matter-of-factly by phone from the Los Angeles Hilton hotel.

It's the latter category that has him talking today. In 2004, Cage made "National Treasure," and it, in turn, made $347 million. Little wonder that a sequel about Ben Gates, the treasure-hunting history buff, was given the green light just months after the release of the original.

But it has taken three years to put out "National Treasure: Book of Secrets." (See synopsis on Page 33.) And Cage will tell you that's partly his fault.

"I was very careful with it, before I said 100 percent yes. I wanted to make sure it was as good as it could be," he explains, "that the movie doesn't just rest on its laurels."

So while the Declaration of Independence is stolen in the first flick, the president of the United States is kidnapped in the second. Along the way, caper clues -- sought to clear the name of Ben Gates's great-great-grandfather from the implication of involvement in the Lincoln assassination -- are picked up at Mount Vernon, the Library of Congress, the Oval Office and Buckingham Palace.

"My favorite thing about Ben Gates is that his only super power is that he's read some history books," Cage says. Part of the appeal of "National Treasure," he adds, is that both movies have the potential to spark a similar interest in audiences, kids in particular. "Children are enormously impressionable, and you want to give them something you can feel comfortable with."

This from the man who won his Oscar for the chilling portrayal of a suicidal alcoholic (1995's "Leaving Las Vegas") and made his directorial debut with an indie film about a male prostitute (2002's "Sonny").

Next up? Another Disney flick, "G-Force," expected to be released in 2009. He lends his voice to an animated mole who works for good rather than evil.

Seems a bit professionally bipolar, no?

Maybe, but Cage does have his reasons. "I think both are good energy, both are healing, both have a place," he says. "It's good to make movies that are tragedies, where people can think about things in life that are undeniable, that everyone has to deal with. . . . But at the same time, it's also healing to make movies that are entertaining, that are a lot of fun -- where you don't have to think about your problems."

That more people are likely to see Cage in a film like "National Treasure" than, say, "The Weather Man," a small but critically well-received 2005 drama, is, he insists, not a point of frustration. More aggravating is the suggestion that it would be.

Some movies "don't lend themselves to enormous box office," he says. "I mean, that's just the way it is -- and that doesn't mean you don't want to make the movie anyhow. . . . I just think it's unfortunate when people perceive it as though the filmmakers thought the movie was going to make $100 million. When you don't have the expectations, you're fine."

And worse, he adds, is the assumption that commercially oriented films are somehow less taxing for actors. "They're both equally difficult in terms of the amount of work that goes into it -- to make sure they both serve the needs of the audience."

In the next few years, Cage will probably be serving the needs of the audience a tad less frequently. His youngest son is about to go into preschool, and, he says, "I think it's time for me to take a little more time off from filmmaking."

But if this "National Treasure" does as well as the last, it's probably a safe bet that the studio gurus won't let Cage keep Ben Gates out of retirement for too long. There are, after all, a lot of ways to strike gold.

END

They should write an article on Ellen McCarthy's choice of corny ending lines. Oh well, I guess it's okay since this article appeared in Highlights For Children and not The Washington Post.