Night at The Museum: Battle of The Smithsonian (2009)

What's the old mantra about movie sequels? Oh right, they suck. There are few exceptions (Terminator 2, Aliens, The Empire Strikes Back), and this is surely not one of them. "When the lights go off, the battle is on," is right, the battle for a better movie.

Ben Stiller (Tropic Thunder, Dodgeball) reprises his role as Larry Daley, a once down on his luck night watchman turned incentive millionaire mogul, is this sequel to the extremely popular family, adventure comedy of 2006 directed by Shawn Levy (The Pink Panther, Cheaper By The Dozen). After learning of the NYC museum restructuring and all his old friends being whisked away to storage neverland in DC, Larry returns to his life of overnight shenanigans as he travels to the capitol in order to return his friends to their rightful place. However, the magical, life giving tablet has also made the journey and now Larry must go up against the likes of the evil Pharaoh Kahmunrah (Hank Azaria, Run Fatboy Run, The Simpsons) and his legion of historical tyranny before he unleashes his minions on an unsuspecting nation. Helping him in the fight is female flying ace Amelia Earhart (Amy Adams, Doubt, Sunshine Cleaning), who develops quite the crush. They are joined by a familiar band of archaic icons, as well as some new ones, as they battle to return things to "normal."

Just as its predecessor, based on the novel by Milan Trenc, this film was received to mixed reviews, and I'm one of them. As visually entertaining and overall pleasing as it may be, its really not a good movie in the classical sense. The acting is marginal, music is blegh, and the characters a bit much, but the special effects are mesmerizing and the story epic. But I think I know what happened here. The first one grossed so much that they couldn't not make another and hope for the same. And that's exactly what happened. This movie out-grossed the original. Thankfully it was marketed as a family comedy, otherwise it wouldn't have stood a chance. The real downside though to me was that the original cast played such a small part this time around. The new characters just weren't enough to sway me. I did enjoy the playful interaction between Stiller and Adams, and Hank Azaria was his normal, masterful character actor self. I especially liked the uncredited cameo by Jonah Hill, it was the only thing that was genuinely laugh out loud in the adult perspective. A must see family favorite, but if you don't have kids it'll be hard finding a valid excuse to see it.

6.8/10

Rated: PG
105 mins