The Mummy Review
By Joe Lozito
May the Corpse be with you
Ah, the glory days of movie monsters, when a gaunt Boris Karloff brooding his way around styrofoam cement halls with powdery makeup would pass for chilling effects. Sure, of the monsters of its time, the Mummy probably falls fourth after Dracula, Frankenstein and the Werewolf. But at least the creature of the original film had his soft side - he wanted to find his ancient lost love. The new film, written and directed by Stephen Sommers has taken the love story out of the Mummy and left us with a standard Hollywood monster. A monster with so many Hollywood effects at its disposal that it's hard to believe that our heros could actually defeat him.
The old monster movies used to be about the creatures themselves. When you think of 1932's "The Mummy", you immediately think of Karloff. No one remembers Zita Johann and David Manners. But certainly if anyone remembers the current rendition, which is similar in name only, the first character to come to mind will be the effects, then maybe Brendan Fraser's adventurer and Rachel Weisz's heroine before reaching Arnold Vosloo who is saddled with the role of the title. Never before has an actor been surrounded by so much and given so little to do.
Hollywood has taken an interesting turn lately. Whereas it used to produce Star vehicles - films tailored for a specific star's talents - it now churns out "Effects vehicles". From the morphing in "Terminator 2" to the lava in "Volcano" to basically all of "The Matrix", recent films strive to bring audiences to theatres only to keep them in enough awe of special effects so that they won't notice the lack of character or believable plot.
While "The Mummy" is a classic example of this Hollywood trend, it does fit the bill well. The creature itself is played as often by computer-generated effects as by an actor. Mr. Fraser plays his hero as a young Indiana Jones less precocious than "Young Indiana Jones". And Ms. Weisz's English librarian redefines the word "plucky". The screenplay, by director Stephen Sommers, keeps the dialogue light and the banter quick, which is a problem since its hard to care what happens to characters who themselves seem none too concerned.
The film is still vaguely about Mr. Vosloo's Imhotep trying to revive his lost love. And supposedly, Ms. Weisz reminds him of her, or maybe he's just grateful that she revived him. It's unclear and, really, it doesn't matter. The effects are great and they keep coming for a full two hours after which you're left feeling "uneffected".
