The Mummy reviewed by Mark Kermode

The Mummy which is a latest reboot of the mummy franchise which dates back to you know the silver the 1930s Karloff it was revived as you rightly said in that series a trilogy of films I think she was in the first two wasn't she Mummy Mummy Returns and then also gave us the Scorpion you know and Dwayne the rock Johnson that's the first time I was kind of really aware of him I'm sure he's been around before that but that was and at the beginning there's a thing that says dark universe because it's part of the you know the dark universe which isn't what the universe or the reviving you know Reba as far as I can tell they're rebooting you know all that all those Universal properties so visible man creature from Black Lagoon Franklin wolf night all that sort of stuff they were going to get together in some kind of who knows I'd I mean I have to say I've kind of got a bit universe out to be honest I'm kind of at the point when I would just like to see a film that existed in and of its own right so anyway um we begin with some fantastically dull plot exposition that explains the backstory of our man death and the deal that she made with the devil Seth and how she was then you know mummified alive and taken from there to somewhat there's a whole bunch o ex position before we even stop then we cut for words you know says years Tom Cruise in in the Middle East conflict zone he is a Nick Morton you know soldier adventurer Tomb Raider and he is searching for antiquities to sell for profit he comes across the tomb of armor net the sarcophagus instantly everything I'm telling you now is in the trailer and because I'm not sure what and no longer sure what constitutes a plot spawn and what doesn't I'm only going to tell you what's in the trailer as far as the plot because there's one there's one particular thing which I'm not going to reveal that other people have done but I'm not going to because singer so anyway second focus goes into the plane plane flies then playing Prussia's big great big plane crash sequence planes brought down and Tom you know he's in the plane crash rightly he's really die in the first time he should be finished off but he then wakes up in the mall still in the trailer incidentally still all in the trailer he then wakes up in the morgue and finds one thing leads to another he's in this weird lair overseen by Russell Crowe experimenting once again with an English accent who does some more of explaining the plot welcome to be Digium mr. Martin from the latter monstrum well we did you a warning of monsters forgive the state of things we have very little time to prepare for our guests and only the information Jennifer provided to go on in truth two words for us it's not an exact science this business and the business being evil mr. Munn recognize contain examine destroy she is by far the most ancient with Levitt Encounters okay I was hoping he was going to burst into song because I can lick it that would have been good yeah no I don't think that would be good so um Boyd Hilton god bless him tweeted this thing today said also there which I'm on Thursday cover blues review of the mummy I was sitting in front of him but I didn't get any vibe and we saw it together in the really self-conscious Jenni no I was going to say that actually the the reason that Boyd didn't get any vibe was because there was no vibe to be got despite the globe-trotting locations the action set-pieces the Mission Impossible style action set-pieces involving you know the zero gravity fully plane thing collapsing buildings massive sets scenes of London being besieged by demonic terror the the poster for that you know the moving post of the island which the central eye does that think about splits the pupils which when you see up in a great big bill but all that looks kind of good despite all that stuff I spent most of them thinking why is this quite so boring and I think the reason is threefold firstly it's a film that looks like a load of other films that you would rather be watching so early on you got okay it's Raiders of the Lost Ark I wish I was watching Raiders of the Lost Ark then it sort of becomes a bit evil day the a bit American Werewolf a bit you know George Romero and I just think I really wish I was watching Evil Dead or George Romero or American werewolf and then it turns into a kind of just pretty straightforward backstory superhero origins film in which you think there are other superhero origins movies that I think I'd rather be watching the second problem is that despite the fact that it's you know it's based on a very famous aura property and they've talked so much about you know you're honoring the thing it's not in any way scary now arguably it's never meant to be scary there's not not meant to be scary at all because it's you know it's not a scary movie it's a mission impossible to do it but it is never scary and it's part of me which thinks if you're going to do this sort of thing quite like it to be scary just a little bit the third thing however which I think is the most important thing is that the script is just absolutely lump and essentially the film can't decide what it wants to be other than a Tom Cruise vehicle and it's like okay it's a Tom Cruise vehicle but what would we bolted onto it what we've got it on the mummy bolted on the universal franchise we've bolted on them severe thing we've bolted on the mission impossible action sequences we bother modulates of it it's basically a Tom Cruise movie and it is so generically a Tom Cruise movie so spec staggeringly generically a Tom Cruise movie that it really could have been called Tom Cruise and then Tom Cruise his mummy it could have really good Tom Cruise in Normandy exactly if this is what the rest of the you know the exam subsequent movies are going to look like I can pretty much sign out of it now I didn't hate it because hate would actually involve being engaged and being being swept up enough to be to have an emotional response to it and there's a certain level at which when you're making this kind of movie there is a technic I mean there's an awful lot of CG but there's an awful lot of certainly it's just a certain level of technical achievement which you come to take for granted and no longer seems in any way exceptional I saw it on a really big screen with the volume turned up to you know eleventy stupid and my main problem was just a complete inability to be interested and as I was watching it I started thinking I remember once saying that from a film critics point of view at the point that you find yourself not interested in something that's the point at which you should probably stop and I said thinking is this me have I literally just got to the point with these kind of trans women that I just don't care and then I saw Wonder Woman another way no it's not me this is me breaking up a Tom Cruise Tom it's not me it's you so here's the problem it's because it is a tub crazy no it is it's just it the problem is it's so mechanical it's just like a like some mechanical fare greats like Pirates of the Caribbean it just feels like we've got a Tom Cruise film what are we going to do let's bolt a whole bunch of stuff onto it regardless of what the actual origins of the project may or may not have been regardless of all the things it may be connected to regardless of the you know scattering universes to which into which it may filter regardless of who some of the other characters turn out to be which I haven't mentioned in this review because it's not in the trailer as before I could think okay well is that going to be a plot spoiler and we don't want to get into a Star Trek you know the situation I know I know I know it but I didn't mind that much of as a plot spoiler about the mummy I I don't want to be the person to spoil anything when really the other thing I would say is that literally the moment Russell Crowe opened his mouth I went really

Channel: kermodeandmayo

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Keywords: Alex Kurtzman, Tom Cruise, Sofia Boutella, Annabelle Wallis, The Mummy, Kermode and Mayo’s Film Review, BBC, 5live

Id: f4BzoULAIk0

Length: 8min 6sec (486 seconds)

Published: Thu Jun 08 2017