Night At The Museum:
Secret Of The Tomb

0 Waffles!

Every big star in this movie needs to live with the fact that he is playing second fiddle to a monkey. Seriously, this monkey has starred in all three Museum movies, The Hangover Part II, the TV show Community and appears in a Marvel short film. This monkey is more successful than all of us combined!

Ben Stiller is back as Larry Daley, and his friends are facing a horrible conundrum. The magic that makes them come to life each night after the museum closes is running out as the golden tablet has started to develop some sort of odd corrosion that is causing everyone to act wacky and turn back into wax figures. Of course, the only person who has the knowledge to save them is stuck in a British museum.

Not ones to let a little inconvenience like that to stop them, Larry and his boss, Dr. McPhee (Ricky Gervais), concoct a ruse to send Larry overseas, but, all of the rest of his museum buddies stow away as well (the producers paid Robin Williams for an entire movie, and he is going to appear in the entire movie even if it makes no sense whatsoever!).

Will Larry and the gang be able to regain the magic?

What surprises will they encounter in Jolly Old England?

Night At The Museum: Secret Of The Tomb is atrocious, and proves it’s never too late to qualify for worst movie of the year.

It is a forced, contrived, outrageously boring funeral dirge of a movie.

It is the antidote for too much smiling and happiness during the holiday season.

Director Shawn Levy along with writers David Guion and Michael Handelman make Night At The Museum: Secret Of The Tomb into a plodding, joyless, uninspired, flat film darting from scene to scene without much hope or consideration for a compelling plot. Even the actors looked bored on the screen as the movie reveals itself as a simple and unspectacular special effects showcase. It’s quite possible George Lucas has taken over the Museum franchise.

When we are not laughing (which is 99% of the movie, unless you find a urinating monkey to be the highest echelon of comedy), Levy and the team try to conjure up some emotion through ridiculously failed attempts to tug at our heartstrings with stories about parting and children leaving the nest.

It results in an overextended ending that relies on fondness and sadness that isn’t there. We are not parting with such sweet sorrow. Most of the audience has been putting on their coats and collecting up their belongings instead of reaching for the tissues.

Top it all off with a horribly placed and ill conceived joke about the Egyptians enslaving Jewish people (as my sister said, “Happy Hanukkah!”), and you have a flop on your hands.

Night At The Museum: Secret Of The Tomb is rated PG for mild action, some rude humor and brief language.