Night at the Museum 3: Secret of the Tomb [PG]

The night programme is booming at the Museum of Natural History with the tablet of Ahkmenrah still making the exhibits come to life at night. But something is wrong. A strange corrosion is coming over the tablet and as it gets worse, so too do the exhibits. It’s as though the life is leaving them. The secret of the tablet lies with Ahkmenrah’s father… in London! Armed with a plan and the help of Atilla, Teddy, Sacajawea, Dexter, Octavius, and Jed, Larry and Ahkmenrah head to the British Museum to save the magic and their friends back home. 

Dedicated to Robin Williams and Mickey Rooney who both sadly died (may they rest in peace) before the film’s release, Secret of the Tomb is the Toy Story 3 of the trilogy. An unforeseen and really quite unlinked third instalment, it brings a lovely close to a series of fun-filled family flicks. As we watched it there was laughter, there were tears, and there were squeals of excitement and anticipation. Equally as delightful as both of its predecessors, this movie promises and delivers everything, including a really brilliant unfathomed cameo! 

The night programme is booming at the Museum of Natural History with the tablet of Ahkmenrah still making the exhibits come to life at night. But something is wrong. A strange corrosion is coming over the tablet and as it gets worse, so too do the exhibits. It’s as though the life is leaving them. The secret of the tablet lies with Ahkmenrah’s father… in London! Armed with a plan and the help of Atilla, Teddy, Sacajawea, Dexter, Octavius, and Jed, Larry and Ahkmenrah head to the British Museum to save the magic and their friends back home. 

It’s fair to say that everything gets bigger in this movie. We saw new and cool things happen at the Smithsonian in the sequel, but everything gets taken to new heights here… and I’m not just talking about most of the drama happening in London. 

One thing that was really enjoyable about this flick was the fact that it had all these little side stories shooting off into all directions. On the one hand, it’s a family movie about museum exhibits coming to life and the quest narrative. On the other hand, this film is working as a means to close the chapter on our favourite characters and, as such, we see a very poignant story of parental development (we actually get hit over the head a bit with this in the dual role that Ben Stiller plays), as well as a few good messages about choosing one’s destiny, future, and ‘quests’. Whilst a lot of these are pretty obvious, they are still done in a very good way. 

I do have to draw special attention to a new character who doesn’t get a lot of attention on the poster/DVD cover, but is totally the star of the show: Sir Lancelot. An exhibit brought to life for the first time, Lancelot proves to be a really pivotal character in every individual story of the film and whilst he begins the movie as a bit of a Custer in the Battle of the Smithsonian (all action and comedy), he quickly takes a bit of a turn and ends up providing a lot of the plot’s central drama and tension. Not often do we see a character that is the epitome of bravery and heroism take a walk on the dark side, it’s actually quite powerful. 

All our favourite characters are back, with the addition of a few new ones and a visit from some familiar faces (which in all honesty was a bit obvious, but I still got excited) and it’s at this point that I want to mention the special effects. Whilst the sequel was all about interpreting characters from history, this movie brings a lot of marble statues, creatures, and events to life: we see Larry battle an amazing Asian snake demon, navigate that crazy drawing with all the stairs all over the place, and Jed and Octavius get caught in Pompeii! 

Starring Ben Stiller, Robin Williams, Owen Wilson, Steve Coogan, Ricky Gervais, Rebel Wilson, Rami Malek, Skyler Gisondo, Dan Stevens, Mizuo Peck, Patrick Gallagher, and Ben Kingsley, Night at the Museum 3: Secret of the Tomb is a classic example of the perfect family movie. Filled with action, magic, adventure, drama, romance, comedy, memorable special effects, character growth, and above all, lovely closure, I really enjoyed this movie. It’s so unbelievably fun!