Night at the Museum is an enjoyable family movie that has enough good things in it to overcome a few drawbacks. It stars Ben Stiller as Larry Daley, a dreamer who’s always trying a new business venture, but who eventually settles for a seemingly mundane job so that he can stay close to and provide some stability for his son, who lives with his ex-wife and her new partner. This job turns out not to be quite so mundane though as, after a brief induction by Cecil (Dick Can Dyke), Gus (Mickey Rooney), and Reginald (Bill Cobbs), he begins working in the Natural History Museum as a night-time Security Guard. The three elderly gents used to do the job between them, but he’s taking on the job alone due to financial cuts. Unbeknownst to Larry, the museum is a place where history really comes alive at night…

So Larry is faced with a seemingly impossible job that includes finding gum for an Easter island head, stopping the cowboys led by Jedadiah (Owen Wilson, who appears uncredited in the movie) and Romans led by Octavius (Steve Cooghan) from trying to destroy each other. He is also inspired by Teddy Roosevelt (Robin Williams), and meets (or runs away from) various other historical figures such as Atilla the Hun (Patrick Gallagher) and Christopher Columbus. Finally his kid can be proud of him… but there’s even more going on than meets the eye (which is bizarre enough). Larry must become a hero, even though Larry is not a traditional hero’s name…

Considering this is essentially a one-joke movie, the plot is very nicely developed and the humour comes from some unexpected places. The screenplay was developed by Ben Garant and Thomas Lennon from the original book by Milan Trenc. Director Shawn Levy does a much better job with this than the last film I saw by him (Cheaper by the Dozen, which was in turn better than the rather awful Just Married), and has a star-studded cast to help him. The special effects were great too, which helps the film no end because it helped to retain the believability of a completely unbelievable situation. All of this was backed up with an excellent musical score by Alan Silvestri The first half of the film does drag a little, with too few real laughs to be had, but it sets up the characters quite nicely. It seemed early on that the film might fall into the trap of having too many characters for any to really be memorable, but recovered later on with some excellent scenes reinforcing the main characters. Most of the cast were excellent, with Robin Williams playing a somewhat subdued part for him but still appearing larger than life, and Wilson / Coogan are often funny in their respective roles as the cowboy / Roman leaders. Stiller was as dependable as ever as ever in the main role, and Dick Van Dyke (without a dodgy cockney accent!) gave probably my favourite performance in the film as one of the old security guards. One of the scenes with Atilla the Hun had me quite helpless with laughter – you’ll know which scene I’m talking about when you see it. Ricky Gervais was intermittently funny and irritating as the Doctor of History in charge of the museum.

Overall Night at the Museum is very enjoyable but not really five-star material, as the beginning is only so-so and there are a couple of plot threads that just go nowhere (a potential romance seemed to be looming for Larry and museum co-worker Rebecca (Carla Gugino), for instance. Perhaps they’re thinking of tying some of these up in a sequel. The humour also seemed a little vicious at times, which wasn’t really necessary. (For instance, the scene where the monkey attacks Larry just seemed a little overdone - though how his nose remained unmarked after being violently chewed by a monkey for fully 40 seconds is beyond me!!)

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close your eyes for a second while scrolling down if you don’t want to see this!!)



(Though seeing Dick Van Dyke perform a high-speed flying round-house kick was hilarious!)




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Rated PG for mild action, language and brief rude humour (I think “language” in this case consisted of one word).

Night at the Museum is a movie that the kiddies may well enjoy slightly more than adults, though for different reasons. There's a lot of slapstick but quite a bit of good dialogue or situation-based humour, so it will appeal to a wide range of moviegoers. (NB - don't think about the plot too hard or your suspension of belief might crumble! Just take it for what it is, light-hearted, fun entretainment.)

Also, you never know, it might encourage your kids to become interested in history!

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Related Links

Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson teamed up previously in Starskey and Hutch

Owen Wilson played a cowboy before in Around the World in 80 Days

Alan Silvestri also provided the music for The Wild


For more children-friendly comedy horror, try Monster House or Wallace and Grommit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit

See also: Top Ten Children's Movies

My Top Ten Movies of 2006


Recommended:
Yes