Review of Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb (2014) by Abcreviews — 28 Dec 2014

Even though I only remember bits and pieces from the first two films, this movie reminded me of my childhood. The acting, of course, was incredible.The scene where Akmenrah met his parents almost, ALMOST, made me tear up.

You could read his emotion on his face - his love for his family, even after having not seen them for years. Robin Williams' final lines were more than a bit touching. The SFX were great, too (the constellation scene had me spellbound), but could have been better.

The ending, on the other hand, left a bit to be desired. They had it set up well enough, with Akmenrah choosing to stay in London with his family and the tablet, while the others left back for New York, but I was expecting more of a relationship between Larry and Tilly.

I was hoping that Larry would teach Tilly about the magic that was now her job every night; I was hoping he would help her learn how to handle the live dinosaurs and tigers and mammoths and war criminals; I was hoping he would at least warn her about what was going on - the two are kindred spirits now, after all.

But no, instead the only thing he tells her is that she'll have the "best job ever." Then it jumps to three years later, which disappointed me because I was eager to see how Tilly would handle her new-found responsibility and how Larry fared after the loss of his night show and if Nick ever went to college or not.

This wasn't the only part that left me frustrated either. There were scenes when I felt the camera was focusing on entirely the wrong thing. During the roof scene, I wanted to shout at the screen "Who cares about the monkey when Akmenrah is crumbling to dust after just having reunited with his family for the first time in decades?!?" Although, in all fairness, this is a children's movie, and children would rather focus on the monkey.

There were also some scenes I felt were a little unnecessary, such as the romance between Teddy and Sacagawea that was thrown in there at the last minute just for good measure (come to think of it, did Sacagawea even do anything in this movie? It seems she was just off to the side the whole time.

I wasn't paying attention to it while I was watching, but I don't think this movie even passed the Bechdel Test). The same goes for the monkey-kiss scene in the falling action. Just because the main character didn't have a female love interest doesn't mean you can substitute in a monkey.

Even though I had my quarrels with the falling action, the resolution ended on a positive note. The magic wasn't gone. It will never be gone. It just moved somewhere else to allow for new adventures and misadventures.

With that said, I feel I should emphasize that this film is for children and families, and some of its shortcomings may be excused because of this. Despite its flaws, I actually enjoyed the movie while I was watching it, and if I didn't appreciate these movies enough as a kid, I certainly do now.