In
Night At the Museum, Ben Stiller is forced to deal with more animals than Noah
(incidentally, Steve Carrell will be running the Noah shtick up the flagpole this
summer as Evan Almighty). Certainly the most impressive critter in this corral
is the "cash cow" that this somewhat stilted Stiller vehicle has unleashed.
You
can't really sit and unload a barrage of criticism at this film, actually you
could, and I probably will - but what would be the point? It's obviously doing
something right - pleasing crowds and achieving what it sets out to do. I don't
suppose much of this will be news to anyone, but Stiller plays a divorced New
Yorker, whose increasingly flaky work history is jeopardizing his custody standing
with his 8 year old son whom he dotes on to a pathetic degree. Paul Rudd, plays
his sons' new step Dad in a "blink and you missed it" performance. He
made the most of every nuance in his 11 second turn.
Desperate
for work he accepts a graveyard security position at the American Museum of Natural
History, strangely the keys are turned over to him by a trio of retiring guards
(including Dick Van Dyke and a loopy and thus occasionally funny Mickey Rooney).
Also along for the briefest of rides is the hilarious Ricky Gervais (one of the
prime movers of BBC's The Office, which has been flipped to the US with some success
courtesy of Steve Carrell. Sadly as funny as some of these bit parts were, the
writing for the two key players Stiller and Robin Williams was uneven and misguided.
Instead of letting Stiller unleash his neurotic, insecure foil as all hell broke
loose, they wrote him as more of a closet hero - a.la Bruce Willis or Indiana
Jones. Strange, in that the set up here was far more suited to Stillers' Focker
or "Something About Mary" persona. His "step aside while I save
the day and impart a few profound life-messages," was all wrong amid the
kooky animal madness he finds himself awash in.
The
nonstop action was the films chief saving grace, and once you accept the pretty
tough to swallow premise, there was some fun stuff watching everything unravel
on the unsuspecting foil, especially for the youngsters. The secret the aging
retirees fail to fully impress upon "the new guy" (Stiller) is that
due to an Egyptian Relic, once business hours are through all of the animals and
human legends come to life. Obviously the madcap hijinks resultant from T-Rex
skeletons to lions, tigers and bears running amok every night makes it so the
night watchman certainly earns his $11.25 an hour. Technically, the films biggest
shortcoming involves its major conflict. It's not that it was implausible or outlandish
it's just that it never really generated any tension or suspense. I think having
Dick Van Dyke as the heavy was the problem. It sort of reduced the threat to kind
of a fairy tale feel. As for Williams, his Theodore Roosevelt was an impressive
visual ringer, but it wasn't written well enough to leap off the screen. I expected
him to slip some sly Jumanji reference in, but negative. And frequent Stiller
sidekick, Owen Wilson's "bit" part was similarly a luke warm.
Night
at the Museum is far from a total waste, it's a fun family film and kids will
get a kick out of it. Unfortunately it wasn't written in a fashion that offers
consistent entertainment for the grown-ups. Or at least the pickier ones. But
considering that it's the first real "rake it in" blockbuster of the
year, I could be wrong.
Who's
In It: 
