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the museum curator and Steve Coogan and Owen Wilson featuring as miniature Romans and Cowboys, the movie boasts a stellar cast and we haven't even mentioned Robin Williams as a horse-bound Theodore Roosevelt yet. However, there are plenty of occasions when the screen is simply too full of what's going on when a defter touch and a more subtle screenplay may have harvested better results.

There are aspects of the movie that work well. Ben Stiller is as reliable as ever in playing the vulnerable sap being taken for a ride by the pantomime villains. He did it well in "Meet the Parents" and here again; he creates an empathy that goes with his vacant stare and puppy dog expressions. That he is the stereotypical American male so prodigiously outlined in so many movies ultimately doesn't detract too much from the end result although the American movie notion that men are mostly divorced, down on their luck and looking to make their fortune by coming up with a stroke of marketing genius is challenged by the contrast of Stiller impressing his son by holding down an ordinary job as a security guard. It was nice to see Steve Coogan still kicking his heels in Hollywood despite the artistically disastrous "Around the World in Eighty Days" and even better to see Ricky Jervais bring his absent-minded brand of comedy to the big screen even if it's nearly impossible to think of him in any other way apart from David Brent. The pace of the movie is frenetic throughout and Shawn Levy takes his directorial experience gained through movies like "Cheaper by the Dozen" and applies them to the breakneck plot that spans the lead's experiences in the surreal world of the museum at night. If nothing else, the movie serves as a great advertisement to go and visit the grand old monolith that is The Natural History Museum in the stunning location of Central New York. Add to that a rollicking musical score by Alan Silvestri and you have an hour and a half or so of mindless family, festive cheer.

Where the movie falls down is its eagerness to please at the expense of a coherent story. With a sub-plot centring on the magical ability of an Egyptian tablet to bring the exhibits to life and the self-centred "Cocoon"-like motives of the old codgers that make up the security guards to steal it for their own purposes and consign the museum residents to a statuesque future, most of the film is simply Ben Stiller chasing around after recalcitrant historical figures. A large part of the run time is spent with the screen filled to overflowing with renegade CGI creations causing mayhem in what looks and feels like anarchy when we know this kind of thing can be done to greater effect a la "Gremlins". Needless to say, there's the obligatory moral to the tale which consigns Stiller's ex-wife and son to inconsequential bit parts in order to justify the plot line. In essence, you can't help feeling that the movie would have benefited from a "less is more" approach.

Rated PG with the suggestion that the movie is unsuitable for under-8s, I really couldn't see anything featured that would stop just about anybody going to see this flick. It's a family movie with a light-hearted story line and an iconic cast. There's slapstick violence in the Tom and Jerry mould but nothing worse than you would see in "The Simpsons" (Simpsons movie due out in 2007!) and at 108 minutes run time, the movie isn't overly long. Children will love it, adults will be entertained but ultimately it's a light piece of seasonal fluff that is instantly forgettable. It's a bit like the annual, home-made knitted jumper you get off your gran each year for Christmas; you'll wear it to please everybody but as soon as nobody is watching you'll change your clothes!

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