Night at the Museum

Night at the Museum is a 2006 American fantasy comedy film directed by Shawn Levy and written by Robert Ben Garant and Thomas Lennon. It is based on the 1993 children's book of the same name by Croatian illustrator Milan Trenc. The film had an ensemble cast of Ben Stiller in the lead role, Carla Gugino, Dick Van Dyke, Mickey Rooney, Bill Cobbs, and Robin Williams. It tells the story of a divorced father who applies for a job as a night watchman at New York City's American Museum of Natural History and subsequently discovers that the exhibits, animated by a magical Egyptian artifact, the tablet of Akhmenrah, come to life at night. 20th Century Fox released the film on December 22, 2006, and it grossed $574.5 million worldwide, becoming the 5th highest-grossing film of 2006, but received mixed reviews from critics. Two sequels were released: Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian in 2009, and Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb in 2014. An animated sequel, Night at the Museum: Kahmunrah Rises Again, was released on December 9, 2022, for the streaming service Disney+. Plot In Brooklyn, Larry Daley is a divorced aspiring inventor bouncing between jobs and apartments. His former wife Erica is sympathetic to his situation, but considers him a bad example to their ten-year-old son Nick, an elementary schooler who considers quitting ice hockey and plans to become a bond trader like his mother's fiancé Don when he grows up; while Larry worries that Nick admires Don instead of him, especially after Nick decides to invite Don to Career Day at his school. Larry is hired as the night security guard at the Museum of Natural History, replacing retiring guard Cecil Fredericks and his colleagues Gus and Reginald. Cecil gives Larry a special instructions manual, warning him not to "let anything in... or out". On his first night, Larry discovers that the museum's exhibits come to life after sunset, including: "Rexy", a playful Tyrannosaurus skeleton; Dexter, a mischievous stuffed capuchin monkey who destroys Larry's manual, along with other taxidermied animals, and later takes his keys; rival miniature civilisations depicting the Old West, Ancient Rome, and Ancient Maya; a chewing gum-loving Easter Island Moai; wax models of Attila the Hun, American Civil War soldiers, and pyromaniacal Neanderthals, as well as Sacagawea, who is encased in glass and cannot hear anyone or anything from outside of it.