Movie Title: Night at the Museum
Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ (6/10)
Year: 2006
Night at the Museum official site: http://www.nightatthemuseum.com/
Now… the line “where everything comes to live” have been so commonly use in some theme park ads, some roller coaster rides, some safari.. la la la… and the list goes on, this time, this movie is gonna tell you… they just ain’t saying it for the sake of saying it. They are gonna prove to you… it really does come to live.
Based on a children’s book, Night at the Museum centres around Larry Daley (Ben Stiller). Larry, a business minded person who always believe he is destined to do something great and comes out with great inventions but so far everything that happens to his life prove him otherwise. He kept trying until he have nothing left and at desperate measures to win his son, Nick Daley (Jake Cherry) support when he felt his position as a role model being threaten by Nick’s more successful stepfather. Larry is all set to look for a full time job that pays his bills.
He was sent to the Museum of Natural History where they offer him a night guard post replacing three old staff, Cecil (Dick Van Dyke), Gus (Mickey Rooney), and Reginald (Bill Cobbs). They gave Larry a quick tour and was kind enough to give him some tips such as “leave some lights on” , “read and follow the instructions on the manual” and “never allow anything in or out of the museum”. Thinking it was an easy job, Larry was simply playing around with the speaker phone and happily sleeping.
He finally woke up when he fall out from his chair to notice the T-Rex skeletons were gone. He then heard some weird noises and as he takes the corner, he got the shock of his life. Everything in the museum turns to life. All the wax dolls were walking here and there, even the miniature dolls we talking. While the T-Rex was attacking Larry, he managed to get Cecil where he once again reminded him to do as what the manual says.
Things was in a chaos.. but the worst was when Dexter, a monkey from the African exhibit simply rip his manual to pieces. He was quickly saved by a wax model, Theodore Roosevelt (Robbin Williams). He told Larry he would only help him this once. Theodore explains to Larry that ever since an Egyptian tablet was brought to the museum, everything comes to life at night. However, the exhibits will turn to dust if they leave the museum and failed to return before sunrise.
Just when Larry decides to leave this weird and life threatening job, Nick walked by the museum to say hi to him. Trying not to disappoint his son, he decided to give his job a second chance. Knowing that there is no extra copy of the manual, Larry takes up Cecil’s advice and learn the history of the exhibits. Getting to work fully equipped, Larry thinks it’s gonna be a smooth sailing night.
Little does he knows nothing got better, in fact things got worst than what he thought. The cowboy miniatures led by Jedediah (Owen Wilson) is always fighting with the Roman army led by Octavius (Steve Coogan), Dexter stole Larry’s key… and what’s worst, one of the caveman jumps out from the window Dexter have left open. It turns to dust right in front of Larry’s eyes when he failed to return to the museum before sunrise.
Looking at the mess created, Larry was fired by Dr. McPhee (Ricky Gervias) when later on Larry asked for another chance to mend his mistakes. Nick was disappointed when he saw his father got fired. Larry, on the other hand try to prove to his son there was something more than what it seems in the museum and decided to cheer him up by bringing him to the museum.
Just as he was about to close the museum, he bump into Rebecca (Carla Gugino). Rebecca admires one of the exhibits, Sacajawea (Mizuo Peck) and is writing a thesis about her. She got stuck half way and was in the midst of giving up. Larry thought he could help Rebecca out by telling her what’s happening to the museum and asked her to come during the night where he can introduce Sacajawea to her. She got angry thinking Larry was mocking her.
When the night comes, nothing moves. Everything just stays as it is. Thinking his father is lying, Nick decides to give up hope on his dad. Larry then explains to Nick and asked Nick to follow him to the Egyptian room only to notice the tablet that brings everything to live was missing.
Larry then realize that Cecil, Gus and Reginald was behind all this. Eventually, besides bringing the exhibits to life, it rejuvenates them as well. They are trying to set Larry up so that they could get their old job back. Nick quickly steals the tablet from them and turns one of the panel and bring everything in the museum to life. The trio then chase after Larry and Nick and soon lock them up in the Egyptian room.
When the Anubis tries to attack them, Larry have no choice but to release the mummy Ahkmenrah (Rami Malek). Upon releasing Ahkmenrah, he ordered the Anubis to break the gates. With Ahkmenrah’s help, Larry manage to befriend Atilla the Hun (Patrick Gallagar) and the others. Larry manage to gather everyone to get together to save the museum as they all know very well, without the tablet, nothing comes to live anymore.
Ah… the ending eh… hmm… happy comedy, based on children’s book, well what can you get? Nothing out of expectations will happen. Which well… in a way is good. Something cool and nice to watch for a good laugh. Er… too little time for character development. In a way, yeah… too many characters was introduced. But well, I sorta forgive them. A museum… if there are only like a few exhibits, I won’t bother to go visit.