honey , i blew up the kid ( 1992 ) * 1/2 . directed by randal kleiser . written by thom eberhardt , peter elbling , garry goodrow . cinematography , john hora . production design , leslie dilley . cast : daniel and joshua shalikar , rick moranis , marcia strassman , robert oliveri , amy o'neill , lloyd bridges et al . a walt disney release . 89 minutes . rated pg . a honey of a movie ? not . its predecessor , " honey , i shrunk the kids , " was far richer in possibilities , suspense , plot , characters and humor . had the filmmakers kept faith with the original's grammar , the sequel would have been titled " honey , i blown up the kid . " but nobody cares about tradition these days . it's all about adam , played by the shalikar twins who are variously reported as 2 or 2 1/2 years old . it depends , i suppose , from whether you count the age at the start or the end of the filming . accidentally zapped by a special ray , adam becomes larger each time he is exposed to an electromagnetic force field . in stages , he reaches 112 feet--at least that's what the press release says--a world record for a human . the previous champion i could locate was " the amazing colossal man , " only 60 feet tall . the ray's inventor is wayne szalinski , adam's dad . he is once again played by rick moranis as a hyper type and a super high-tech rube goldberg . he looks dim and is inept with simple daily chores . welcome back to the old cliche about the absent-minded professor , the spacey scientist or the intellectual discombobulated by " real " life . ( a lot of strange people are named wayne these days , in movies ) . " honey 2 " is a single-joker , whereas " honey1 " had variety . the spanish saying " if you lie down with babies , you wake up wet " applies here . if your entire movie is about a colossal kid , there's little you can do except follow him with the camera , hope for the best and try to be flexible , fitting whatever baby does to your framework . as adam's size increases so does the movie's yawn quotient . two feeble mini-subplots--wayne's nasty superior , adam's older brother and a babysitter--are of small help . the film does very little with people , context or dialogue . it's all about special effects and adam's " ooh , aah " cuteness . big deal . adam doesn't say much either . a little eve would have been more interesting , since girls seem to develop speech faster . i retained just one nice , throwaway conceit and two good lines . the szalinskis' suburb in desert-surrounded las vegas is called " vista del mar " ( " sea view " ) . the sentences , funny in context , are : " there's no way i'm changing those diapers " and " look at that mother ! " the special effects bring modern techniques to the venerable screen genres about gigantic people , animals or prehistoric creatures , whose size was caused by arrested evolution , encounters with aliens , nuclear radiation and such . some of those pictures became classics , like " the lost world " ( 1924 ) or , better yet , " king kong " with all its mythological , freudian or sociological implications . sometimes , as in " the attack of the 50 ft . woman , " the movies dreadful enough to become howls . " honey 2 " is neither campy , droll , or suspenseful . you know that no harm will come to the child , that adam will do only material damage , and that he will get back to regulation size at the end . i heard just one big laugh from the audience , and this from an adult . the many children in the theater were quiet throughout . confused by the sights ? by the technobabble ? overawed ? plain bored ? nowadays even the best special effects seldom impress the public . we take movie magic for granted . it is no longer like earlier periods when giant squids , invisible men or lilliputians took the spectators' breath away and had them asking each other : " how did they do it ? " in the small part of a laboratory watchman is redhead ken tobey , that likable second-shelf actor , who , as kenneth tobey , had his hour of glory when he played the lead in the classic sci-fi horror " the thing " of 1951 . nice to see him again . it's a small bonus for aficionados clutching at straws . 
