There’s also only one laugh — one — and all the special effects in the world simply can’t make up for a single chuckle over 105 very long minutes. The only good news is that Ben Stiller appeared to be even more bored than I was.

If you remember, Larry Daley (Stiller) was once a night guard at the Museum of Natural History in New York City where after the sun went down, thanks to ancient artifact, the exhibits all came to life. Mayhem ensued, adventure was had and lifelong friendships were formed.

A few years have passed (between films and for our characters) and today Larry has managed to tinker his way into fortune and some fame as a highly successful entrepreneur hawking inventions, like his glow-in-the-dark flashlight (so you can find it when the power goes out, duh), on infomercials.  

As is always the case in these films, success has made Larry unhappy and distracted, too worried about business meetings and deal-making to be the good father and friend he once was. For months now he’s neglected his museum friends and when he does show up for a long overdue visit he finds most of them boxed up for permanent storage, bound for the basement of the Smithsonian in Washington DC.

Of course Larry will have to save them and in the process the entire Smithsonian comes alive, including paintings, sculptures, a black and white Al Capone, a preening General Custer (Bill Hader), an obnoxious, hyper-feminist Amelia Earhart (Amy Adams) and even the giant President Lincoln normally found seated in his DC memorial.  Returning for a second round is Owen Wilson’s miniature cowboy, who’s given much more to do than the barely returning Robin Williams as Teddy Roosevelt, Attila the Hun and Sacajawea.

Hank Azaria is our flamboyant baddie Kahmunrah, a lisping Pharaoh desperate to get his hands on the artifact that brought him and everything else to life. The plan is to resurrect his 2000 year old army and take over the world … or some such thing.

Other than the special effects, which are convincing, it’s obvious no one cared about anything else like believable relationships or a plot that made a lick of sense. The plot holes that keep Larry alive and running around all on his own are insulting. This isn’t a movie aimed at kids, this is a movie aimed at dumb kids … kids in need of helmets.

The dialogue’s terrible, full of those halting, irreverent asides that increasingly pass for wit these days, and the action scenes lack both excitement and tension. People run, people fight, people talk and talk and talk. Every character arc feels forced, the relationships even more so. When the great Ricky Gervais can’t brighten up his bookended moments, what hope is there for anything else?

Most lacking is any sense of magic or joy. When a movie advertises the Smithsonian coming to life, no matter how lackluster the rest might be, you expect at least a couple of “wow” moments, but there’s not a single one.

If there’s anything to recommend it’s a rare and appreciated sense of reverence director Shawn Levy shows for American history in this, a mainstream Hollywood film produced for young, impressionable minds. Even General Custer is given an un-PC opportunity to redeem himself and it’s nice to hear Teddy Roosevelt call America “a great country” and Amelia Earhart credit “American ingenuity” for the invention of flight. It’s just a sad fact these days that characters aren’t allowed to talk like this.  

Most interesting is a moment in front of the White House when a historical character says something like, “I’ve heard a great man leads this union.” You have to wonder if that line would’ve been allowed when Bush was president or had McCain won… Damn, I’m cynical.

Between this and the equally uninspired “Terminator Salvation,” if you must leave the house for a movie this holiday weekend, Blockbuster is your best gamble.

We’ve celebrated the good.  We’ve dreaded the bad.

Now on to the maybes; those that could fall either way, or just do the minimum by delivering a couple hours of forgettable entertainment. I’ll take that and truth be told, when the lights dim, they’re all “maybes” to me because when the lights dim I’m twelve again. But the lights aren’t dimming now and in the cool light of day I’m on the fence over these.

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May 22nd: Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian - The first one was a splendid concept brought down by a cookie-cooker plot involving a dad having to redeem himself. The hope is that the sequel is looser and less constrained by boilerplate convention. I’m a little ticked The Mighty Mickey Rooney wasn’t brought back, but it’s still a great concept and one helluva cast.

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May 29th: Drag Me to Hell – After being buried for nearly a decade by Spider-Man, director Sam Raimi makes a long overdue return to his roots in the horror genre. This is a “maybe” because as a huge fan of the “Evil Dead” trilogy, I. Must. Manage. Expectations. Everything that made “Evil Dead” so special, the low-budget, the obvious hunger to succeed… Well, let’s just say that it’s not easy to go home again. Who am I kidding … I’m counting the days.

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May 29th: Up – Pixar or no, animation is not my bag. What can I say, I like actors. In this whole burst of animation over the last decade or so, I’ve only fallen in love with “Ratatouille,” and “The Incredibles,” the former especially. Brad Bird is responsible for both and not involved with “Up.”

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June 5th: The Hangover – Drunken misadventures in Las Vegas. Could be lame, could be a mindless gem like Tom Hanks’ “Bachelor Party.” If the runtime hangs around 90 minutes, there’s hope. Another positive is BenderSpink, a hit-or-miss production company, but they do comedies well. I’m also heartened by the fact that Judd Apatow is in no way involved.

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I know this photo is from the first one and I don’t care.

June 24th: Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen - Except for that godawful shaky-cam, the first one delivered in a lot of ways. It was also openly patriotic and very pro-military. Please, Michael Bay, step away from the shaky-cam. It probably wouldn’t hurt to cut 35-minutes out of the 147-minute runtime, either.

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June 26th: The Hurt Locker - Director Kathryn Bigelow understands driven men of action better than most male directors and earned my eternal goodwill with the lean mean vampire-Western, “Near Dark” way back in 1987. She’s an enormously gifted director, but her script choices always lack. The stories are too long and too cluttered. In some cases, like “Blue Steel” and “Point Break,” you can see there’s a great film struggling to get out. If “Hurt Locker” were 101 minutes instead of 131, my enthusiasm would be higher. I do, however, trust her to tell an Iraq war story respectfully.

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July 31st: Funny People – Judd Apatow has yet to make a film I’m glad I saw. His crudeness is strictly for crudeness sake (you can always feel the strain for the “iconic” moment), his stars are almost always incapable of sincerity or warmth, and his self-indulgence is everywhere with scene after scene that lingers unnecessarily long, way past a payoff. On the other hand, Adam Sandler is the star here and I’ve been a fan of the Happy Madison sensibility since “Billy Madison.” So there’s no telling what to make of this. But I’d bet my house that the 131-minute runtime is a problem.

You might have noticed a pattern here and that’s the length of some of these.

The talent and confidence to tell a simple, linear story with a satisfying climax and sympathetic characters seems all but dead today. “Taken,” “Gran Torino,” and Stallone’s revival of his Rocky and Rambo characters did it, but nowadays too many of these films are over-stuffed as if dulling the senses with special effect excess is the goal. And if you can’t tell a simple story well, all you have left is your effects budget.

That Judd Apatow is taking this philosophy to comedies is the most disturbing trend in modern film since that godawful shaky-cam.

Here’s hoping they’re all classics and make $300 million.