'Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian' review

It was on sale last week, I picked it up, watched it right away, and then slacked on reviewing it. Shame on me.

Synopsis:

A few years have passed since Larry was a night watchman at the Museum. Now he's a successful inventor and CEO that gets back to visit his friends at the Museum on occasion. Unfortunately, during a Museum refurb, most of the exhibits are to be packed up for storage in the National Archives. The tablet is not meant to go with them but, well, monkeys are monkeys...

Thoughts:

 I like Museums and, therefore, I enjoyed the original for what it was, the daydream that I'd often had about the night time activities of the exhibits in the local Museum. This manages to succeed as a sequel while being more of the same and yet something new.

One thing I like about the magic at the center of everything, the Egyptian tablet that brings the exhibits to life, is that the rules of it are defined without being too closely defined. They never sit down and go 'this is how it works' but certain rules can be observed as being in place, such as items brought to life stay active until the sunrise. At the same time, by not being too defined, it allows for the use of imagination. We're also told that this 'life' is merely a 'parlour trick' compared to the full powers of the tablet so there's still some room for manuevering.

The story allows for main character Larry (Ben Stiller) to have another character arc and learn an important lesson about himself before the end of the film. While this arc does make sense given the events of the film, there's still a certain family friendly, happy ending feel to it that's a bit too easy. Most of the characters have a similar arc, where Very Important Things are learned via a Catch-Phrase or a Clever Saying at the Right Time or the Inspiring Speech That Makes You Think. Many of the characters from the original movie either don't appear here or spend much of this movie locked up, appearing briefly so that new characters at the new location can be used.

This would be much more annoying if the rest of the movie wasn't so fun. Thankfully it is a lot of fun. Much of this is due to the vibrant quality of Amy Adams playing the animated Amelia Earhart. She is energetic, positive, sassy, full of dated slang, and all sorts of pretty. She makes herself Larry's companion through the movie and it becomes very easy to cheer for her adventurousness. She is very gung-ho. She rules the picture apart from the bits that Hank Azaria's Kahmunrah character lord over. As head bad guy and Egyptian know-it-all, Hank shines as an over-the-top nogoodnik. When he first appeared, I was confused by his odd manner of speech but after a few seconds I realized he was doing an impression of Boris Karloff! Mummy reference! Excellent!

One of the moments I was most looking forward to, the cameo of both Darth Vader and Oscar the Grouch, was a bit of a let down. Oscar's not a 'take over the world' type of character, quickly noted as just grouchy by Kahmunrah and therefore the joke is too forced. It's not funny because it's out of character. The associated Darth Vader moment is almost entirely in the trailer. I like Star Wars related buffoonery but this also falls flat, especially as it comes directly after the Oscar the Grouch moment.

The bulk of the movie is a fun, adventure romp. I felt it held together well enough with no particularly painful plot holes. That said, I'm inclined to think that sneaking into a government building might be more difficult than it is portrayed here. Unless they outsourced the security functions to the lowest bidder in which case it's probably even easier. Just don't worry about it too much and enjoy the mobile Lincoln Monument. It should be a ride at Universal Studios.

Recommendation to watch. Worth renting. If you enjoyed the original enough to buy it, pick this up as well.