If this doesn’t make sense, I wrote it in and out of sleep last night.
We open a nerdyish boy and girl (both 15) on a class field trip heading the Queens Museum of Science. As they sit on the bus, other high school students are making fun of them calling them typical high school insults. The Earth Science teacher, Mr. Warren, played doofishly by David Arquette tells the other kids to leave Ben and Milla alone. Ben and Milla are our nerds and we can assume they are played by any combination of the Stranger Things kids, I don’t really care.
Anyway, the class gets to the Museum and Mr. Warren tells them they have 2 hours to explore the museum, but not leave or get lost. The rest of the kids seem mostly disinterested in the museum as a whole, but Ben and Milla really love it. They spend their day exploring all of the different areas of the museum until they come across one part of the museum that explicitly states “no trespassing” Milla, who always seems to goad Ben tells them they should sneak a peek inside. Ben, the more reserved one, says they shouldn’t but Milla wears him down. When they peak in, they see what looks to be a space ship in an below-ground hangar. They cautiously approach the door of the spaceship, which is glowing bright red, and as soon as Ben puts his hand on the door, it flies open and a giant creature flies out. For dramatic effect, the lights in the room flicker off and on, and Ben and Milla look ahead as a Tyrannosaurus Rex stares right back at them and says, “Thank you” Ben and Milla both go “WHAT?!?!?” and they pass out simultaneously. SMASH CUT to the title card REX and the CITY
When we cut back Ben and Milla are both shocked to see a dinosaur, much less a talking one. They ask him how is that he can talk, and in a flashback sequence we see that the dinosaurs didn’t become extinct. They were abducted by aliens and brought to space where they forcefully evolved into more refined beings. Anyway, he says his name is Rex and he’s been stuck in this museum for weeks trying to repair the ship, but he needs more parts. He was on his way to explore earth, but had to make an emergency crash landing. Milla tells Rex that Ben’s single dad runs a junkyard in Manhattan (it’s a kids movie, geography doesn’t matter), and that he would probably have tons of stuff that Rex could use. Rex thinks it’s a great idea and is raring to go, but they have the issue of getting Rex out of the museum and onto the schoolbus. They sneak around the museum stealing the clothing off of statues (yes i know its a science movie, shut up) and eventually get him on the boss. It’s a typical trench coat and sunglasses sort of situation where people don’t have any idea Rex isn’t human. Anyway they get off the bus, and Milla walks Ben to his Upper West Side apartment and says that she’ll see him and Rex tomorrow. Ben pleads with her to help him figure out a plan. They decide that Ben’s midtown junkyard would be the best place to keep him and Rex agrees. As they head to midtown, Rex comments that he’s never seen such a beautiful place, and that he’d like to see as much of their lives as possible. Begrudingly Ben agrees and Milla falsifies some school documentation to get him enrolled in The Chelsea Academy.
The next day, Ben and Milla walk into the building with a poorly disguised Rex and everything seems to be into/attracted to Rex.
Assume the plot to Encino Man happens for a while here, only this time Ben doesn’t like some other girl, he actually likes Milla, and Milla likes him too, but has been waiting all year for him to make a move. While all that crap is happening Rex is suddenly the most popular kid in school and somehow Ben and Milla get popular. He’s also been to all the major tourist locales all over the city. During all of this however, Mr. Lameski, played way too over, by Paul Giamatti, thinks something is wrong with Rex, and starts sneaking around to see if Rex ever slips on his disguise. Rex gets wise to Lameski trying to figure him out and Ben and Milla and have different ideas. Milla thinks he should probably go back to the ship until it’s ready, and Ben selfishly wants Rex around because he’s making Ben cooler and now girls are into him. This pisses Milla off and she leaves. We see her at home looking a picture of her and Ben when they were in 5th grade. In the creepiest of moves, it turns out Rex can camoflage himself and followed Milla. I guess he’s starting to get bummed out with Ben too, but says, that he’ll be gone soon and they can go back to normal. Milla says she doesn’t want to just go back to normal, so Rex says “Then tell Ben how you really feel…not how you low key feel…how you HIGH key feel.” Milla, now laugh crying says ok, but that Rex can never speak like that again.
Now we open on some dance, where Kendrick Lamar, playing a fellow high schooler named Mitchell gets the party started. Ben is sitting by himself drinking punch, when Milla comes into the room. Ben walks over to her and before he can say anything, Mr. Lameksi snatches the microphone away from Mitchell and says he’s got some very disturbing news. He says that Rex isn’t really just high school kid. He’s a dinosaur. The kids don’t believe it, but Rex also confirns that he isn’t the cool guy everyone knows. He takes off the trench coat revealing himself to be a dinosaur. At first people get nervous and then make mention of wanting him to leave. Ben comes to Rex’ aid however and gives a very stirring speech about the fact that he used to hate being different, but ever since Rex got there, everyone looked at Ben like he was a nobody. Now they like him. And He has Rex to thank. If people feel like Rex was cool enough for them before, it shouldn’t matter than he’s a talking dinosaur. Mr. Lameski says none of that matters because high school is for humans, not lizard people. Mr. Warren tells Lameski to back off and everything works out smoothly.
We close on Mitchell telling everyone to line up because it’s time to dance. Josh Homme, and the rest of the Queens of the Stone Age begin playing their one song everyone knows. Ben and Milla slow dance together while Rex teaches everyone else how to do The Rex.
Oh yea before I forget, Ben and Milla had a very funny scene earlier where Rex was invited to Ben’s house for dinner.
Ok back to the plot. 5 days later, Ben and Milla are able to the parts Rex needed to go back home. Right as he thanks them both and says they will be friends for life, Milla (who despite being 15 is somehow more attractive now than the beginning of the movie) asks Rex what he was doing on earth anyway. He very coyly says “wouldn’t you like to know” and his ships departs so fast they think he teleported away. Right under where his ship was, Ben sees a book. He picks it up, laughs, and passes the book to Milla. The book is titled “How to make humans fall in love”
The end
I high key like this