‘Welcome to a new world of gods and monsters’
The Mummy is a 2017 American action-adventure horror film co-produced and directed by Alex Kurtzman (Cowboys & Aliens; Sleepy Hollow; Venom) from a screenplay written by David Koepp, Christopher McQuarrie, and Dylan Kussman. The film was co-produced by Chris Morgan and Sean Daniel.
The movie stars Tom Cruise, Annabelle Wallis, Sofia Boutella, Jake Johnson, Courtney B. Vance and Russell Crowe.
With a reported budget of $125 million, The Mummy was released on June 9, 2017. Box Office Mojo has confirmed that worldwide movie theater income amounted to $409,104,837 which was disappointing for Universal who had hoped to launch a new ‘Dark Universe’ of monster movies.
In 1127 A.D., several English crusader knights bury an Egyptian ruby within the tomb of one of their members. In present-day London, a construction crew discovers the tomb and a mysterious man is authorized to investigate the site. Ominous reporting on the news notes that people are not as far from important relics of the past as they realize.
In a flashback to the New Kingdom era, Princess Ahmanet is first in line to succeed her father Menehptre until his second wife gives birth to a son. Determined to claim the throne for herself, Ahmanet summons Set, who agrees to help her if she uses a mystical dagger known as the Dagger of Set to transfer his spirit into a corporeal form. After killing her family, Ahmanet attempts to sacrifice her lover to Set but is captured by her father’s priests and condemned to be mummified alive for eternity. Her sarcophagus is buried in Mesopotamia and submerged in a pool of mercury so that her monstrous form will not escape.
In present-day Iraq, Sergeant Nick Morton and Corporal Chris Vail, while on Long Range Reconnaissance for the U.S. Army, discover the tomb of Ahmanet after calling in an airstrike on an insurgent stronghold. Jennifer Halsey, an archaeologist who had a one-night stand with Nick and had her map stolen by him, arrives and investigates the tomb, correctly concluding that it is a prison. After Nick extracts Ahmanet’s sarcophagus from the pool of mercury, Nick’s superior, Colonel Greenway, places it on a transport plane headed to England…
In the US, The Mummy was released on 4K Ultra HD, Blu-ray, and DVD on September 12, 2017.
Buy: Amazon.com
- Deleted and Extended Scenes
- Cruise & Kurtzman: A Conversation Rooted in Reality – Tom Cruise and Alex Kurtzman discuss the making of The Mummy.
- Rooted in Reality – Filmmakers and cast reveal how they broke away from old tropes and traditions to create a dynamic and realistic 21st century monster movie.
- Life in Zero-G: Creating the Plane Crash – Watch Tom Cruise, Annabelle Wallis, and the crew shoot the incredible plane sequence.
- Meet Ahmanet – Sofia Boutella shares the excitement of reinventing a monster icon.
- Cruise in Action – A behind-the-scenes look at Tom Cruise’s most memorable Mummy stunts.
- Becoming Jekyll and Hyde – Find out how the casting of Russell Crowe brought a bold new dimension to the roles of Jekyll and Hyde.
- Choreographed Chaos – Watch as cast and filmmakers create an epic outdoors clash between ancient and modern worlds.
- Nick Morton: In Search of a Soul – Tom Cruise describes what drew him to play a man seemingly without a soul.
- Ahmanet Reborn Animated Graphic Novel – Witness Ahmanet’s descent into the monstrous underworld as she is reborn into the Goddess of Chaos and Wrath.
- Feature Commentary with director and producer Alex Kurtzman and cast members Sofia Boutella, Annabelle Wallis, and Jake Johnson
In the UK, The Mummy was unleashed on Blu-ray + DVD + Digital HD on 23 October 2017.
Buy: Amazon.co.uk
Reviews [may contain spoilers]:
“It never finds an agreeable balance between the action, horror, or comedic elements that are all fighting for our attention. By contrast, Stephen Sommers’ ’99 effort was much more capable at juggling its jaunty sense of humor with its creepier aspects. There are some horror sequences that work on a very basic level in Kurtzman’s film…” Arrow in the Head
“While there’s no conceivable need to turn The Mummy into an action movie, I’d be forgiving it were a good one. There are a couple of solid action sequences, but even a thrilling plane crash shot in actual Zero G cannot pull the film above mediocrity. A cool underwater sequence in which Cruise’s character is attacked by ravenous, zombie-like creatures set out to the Mummy’s bidding is too little, too late.” Broke Horror Fan
“An odd but frothily entertaining genre cocktail, which coasts on the charisma of its two biggest names and keeps things just fun enough to forgive its considerable lapses in narrative.” Dan Jolin, Empire
“In the end, having encouraged us to cheer for Tom Cruise as an all-around hero, the film tries to have it both ways and confer upon him some of the sepulchral glamour of evil, and he almost has something Lestat-ish or vampiric about him. Yet the film really won’t make up its mind. It’s a ragbag of action scenes which needed to be bandaged more tightly.” Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian
“The Mummy isn’t completely rotten, but given its heritage and larger ambition it feels frustratingly generic and unfulfilling. There are moments where it reaches out for horror and produces something interesting and distinct from Hollywood’s other blockbusters, but those moments are buried beneath unremarkable and, by the end, tedious action sequences.” IGN
” …I found something almost admirable about the film’s cheek. It’s amazingly relentless in its naked borrowing from other, better horror and sci-fi movies that I was able to keep occupied making a checklist of the movies referenced.” Glenn Kenny, RogerEbert.com
“The Mummy is a literal-minded, bumptious monster mash of a movie. It keeps throwing things at you, and the more you learn about the ersatz intricacy of its “universe,” the less compelling it becomes.” Owen Gleiberman, Variety
“Like Van Helsing, it’s an everything-but-the-kitchen-sink movie, with mummies, Jekyll and Hyde, and zombies, too. The director, Alex Kurtzman, keeps the action hurtling forward, but the fight scenes have no witty filips, no dash, and there’s so much CGI that the movie feels prefab.” David Edelstein, Vulture
“I wish I had something more profound to describe just how atrocious this movie is. The Mummy is a monster mash-up of ideas from anywhere David Koepp could steal from–and all those ideas meshed together causes the plot to go belly up. The big reveal at the end is so cringeworthy I almost broke my Coccyx from clenching my butt cheeks together in anger.” Valerie Complex, Hypable
“All it has to offer is silly ideas (the mummy is buried in mercury), impressive-in-the-trailer / meaningless-in-the-movie images (the snarling giant sandstorm face is lifted from the 1999 Mummy) and loose ends to be picked up later (including whatever the hell Russell Crowe’s deeply unimpressive Jekyll-and-Hyde is doing). Honestly, the franchise was better served by Abbott and Costello Meet the Mummy (1955).” Kim Newman, Sight & Sound
Cast and characters:
- Tom Cruise as Nick Morton
- Russell Crowe as Doctor Henry Jekyll and Mr. Edward Hyde
Annabelle Wallis as Jenny Halsey - Sofia Boutella as Princess Ahmanet / The Mummy
- Jake Johnson as Sergeant Chris Vail
- Courtney B. Vance as Colonel Greenway
- Marwan Kenzari as Malik
- Simon Atherton as Crusader
- Javier Botet as Set
- Selva Rasalingam as King Menehptre
- Dylan Smith as Lorenzo Montanari
- Sohm Kapila as Reporter
- Sean Cameron Michael as Archaeologist
- Rez Kempton as Foreman
- Chasty Ballesteros as Kira Lee
Filming locations:
Namib Desert, Namibia
Natural History Museum, South Kensington, London, England
Old Central St. Martins, 12-48 Southampton Row, London, England
Oxford, Oxfordshire, England
The Warrington, 93 Warrington Crescent, Maida Vale, London, England
Waverley Abbey, Surrey, England
Winterfold Forest, Surrey, England
Related:
The Shuffling Saga of the Mummy on Screen – article
