Unaccompanied Minors - 2006

This is something I should have gotten to a while ago, but since Christmas 2009 is almost here, I decided to finally talk about the 2006 film Unaccompanied Minors.

Unaccompanied Minors is a family comedy about a bunch of kids who get stranded at an airport during the holidays. It stars Tyler James Williams (Everybody Hates Chris), Gia Mategna, Brett Kelly (Bad Santa) and others as the kids, plus an astonishing roster of comedy talent in supporting roles: Lewis Black, Rob Corddry, Jessica Walter, Rob Riggle, David Koechner, B.J. Novak, Mindy Kaling, Kristen Wiig, and three of the five Kids in the Hall!

For those of who you haven't seen it, the reason I'm mentioning it here is that it features a peculiar sub-plot: Brett Kelly's character, a mostly-silent, painfully shy kid named Timothy "Beef" Wellington, is obsessed a with the toy he carries around all through the movie: an Aquaman action figure!

I won't get into the detailing the plot of the whole movie, because if you haven't seen it and have you should rent it--its a nice movie, with some good gags. Nothing terribly ambitious going on here, but I usually find "family movies" almost intolerable, but this one mixes in the laughs and sweetness well, and the roster of very funny supporting characters is a major plus (the film was directed by Paul Feig, creator of Freeks and Geeks, a guy that knows how to round up talented people.

But the Tim character doesn't just carry the Aquaman action figure in the movie s a prop--there's a sequence where he has to bargain with someone else (for what, I can't remember--sorry), and he reluctantly offers up the only thing of value he has: his Aquaman:

I don't know what world it is that you could trade a used, beat-up Aquaman action figure for...anything, really, but its a world I'd like to visit!

Eventually young Tim breaks out of his shell and starts to make friends, and even garners a little female attention by the end of the movie:

Unaccompanied Minors was produced by Warner Bros., so I'd say there's a fair chance that the plot simply required the little boy to carry around a beloved action figure and Warners was going to make damn sure it was a character they owned.

But I am curious as to why it's Aquaman--maybe there's a story there, maybe not.