In a sequel to “Night at the Museum,” Larry Daley (Ben Stiller) returns as a steward of museum specimens and a seeker of his true self. Writers Robert Ben Garant and Thomas Lennon, the duo who earlier wrote “Herbie Fully Loaded,” adapted Milan Trenc’s 1993 children’s book “The Night at the Museum” for the 2006 film. Larry was then a failed inventor of gizmos. Perennially evicted, this divorced dad also failed to show up for Parent Career Day at his son’s school. He got an $11.50-an-hour job as the night guard at a New York City museum where historic wax figures, toy soldiers, taxidermized animals and a dino skeleton came to life every night, thanks to an ancient Egyptian gizmo. Now Larry is a wildly successful purveyor of gizmos who risks blowing a big deal with Wal-Mart, so he can repatriate his old museum pals after they’re crated and trucked to the archives in D.C. Director Shawn Levy is big on wacky chaos with intermeshed casts of live actors, CGI-critters and an rascally capuchin monkey. Larry’s pals include Amy Adams as Amelia Earhart, Steve Coogan as Octavius, Mizuo Peck as Sacajawea and a Hank Azaria as a lisping Egyptian pharaoh aiming for world domination. Larry learns the good life is “doing what you love with the people you love.” This shiny, bright, hyperactive fantasy adventure might boost museum attendance. (On the Smithsonian Institution’s site, Levy claims the first film caused a twenty percent surge in museum attendance in New York City.) The sequel’s cutest kick is animating artworks by Jackson Pollock, Jeff Koons, Grant Wood and Alfred Eisenstaedt. Best detail: in “Nighthawks” by Edward Hopper, the iconic diner’s cook breaks the neck off a bottle, and vaults the counter to join a rumble. With Ricky Gervais, Robin Williams, Christopher Guest, Owen Wilson, Alain Chabat, Bill Hader and the voices of the Jonas Brothers as animated marble cupids. 105m. Anamorphic 2.40 widescreen. (Bill Stamets)
