Title – The Mummy (2017)
Director – Alex Kurtzman (People Like Us)
Cast – Tom Cruise, Annabelle Wallis, Sofia Boutella, Russell Crowe, Jake Johnson
Plot – After awakening the ancient evil of Egyptian Princess Ahmanet (Boutella), mercenary for hire Nick Morton (Cruise) alongside archaeologist Jenny Halsey (Wallis) must fight to defeat the Princess, who’s hell-bent on taking over the world no matter the cost.
“You can’t run. You can’t escape. She’s got plans for you”
Review by Eddie on 12/09/2017
As a potential franchise and extended universe starter, The Mummy is about as bad as it gets.
As a film judged in its own rights, The Mummy is sadly equally as dire.
I still remember viewing the Brendan Fraser starring Mummy’s during my childhood and while those films are the very definition of popcorn entertainment, they had a certain charm and energy about them this Alex Kurtzman’s Tom Cruise starring flop has so little of.
Kurtzman’s film is so devoid of any form of spark or enthusiasm, that the whole thing should’ve been wrapped up in cloth and bound and thrown into a very deep tomb for the world never to see but for some reason this non-event was billed as one of the year’s biggest blockbuster events.
Reception and box office receipts attest to the fact that that was not to be the case and it’s not hard to see why audiences failed to warm to this below-average experience despite the presence of its normally bankable leading man.
One of the main problems with Kurtzman’s film, of which there are many of, is the fact that if you’ve seen any of the Mummy’s over their cinematic history you’ve seen this iteration done before and while the filmmakers try to hide their generic plotline with the addition of Russell Crowe’s Dr. Jekyll or an abundance of action sequences (of which only a plane crash stands up as being exciting or inventive), it doesn’t help save the films inability to make us warm to it or make us care in the slightest about what’s happening.
Lumbered with a dull and tiresome role as the films central figure Nick Morton, Cruise seems to have come to terms with himself to the fact he signed the wrong contract and delivers one of his most charmless performances as the supposedly roguish Morton
It’s not likely you’ll ever hear anyone admit to this but so bad is Cruise’s role and so tired his delivery, that you’ll be wishing for the good old days of Fraser’s antics and surrounded by an uninterested looking cast that includes Jake Johnson, Annabelle Wallis and Sofia Boutella as the films terrible big bad Princess Ahmanet, Cruise and the whole acting ensemble bring nothing to The Mummy’s table and fail to save a film that’s drowning in a sea of uninspired ideas and executions.
Final Say –
Almost everyone has called The Mummy out as being not only one of the year’s worst films but a potential killer to Universal’s Dark Universe series and even with an open mindset and a will to be entertained, The Mummy fails at almost everything it does, which includes killing Tom Cruise’s usual power to elevate films his a part of.
1 zombie friend out of 5
Jordan and Eddie (The Movie Guys) 
RIP DUCU
I think so! Be hard to recover from this one.
E
I actually fell asleep while watching this and had nothing to say about it, at all. Sofia Boutella is interesting and has a couple of good moments that woke me up. She redeems her few moments in this and in “Atomic Blonde”. Could somebody please cast her in a decent movie? And you wrote a terrific review so you stayed awake. Well done. Thank you for confirming the thoughts that disrupted my snoozing.
I must admit you talking about snoozing through this one made me realised I should’ve done the same! I can’t believe just how tiresome this was and had literally zero energy around it.
E
Very bad film. I think they should just scrap the Universe in entirety. I remember they wanted Dracula Rising to be the start and then decided against it. There’s a Bride of Frankenstein movie coming out before Frankenstein haha!!
This universe sounds like a terrible idea I agree! I can’t imagine any of the films coming out for it being a big success unless something very big changes it all.
E
I didn’t see it, but it sounds like it was just dreadful. Say what you will about the Fraser film; that film was fun.
So true, whenever I see it on TV I end up watching far more of it than I planned, its just a real fun and silly trip.
E
It’s sad to see Universal try so hard to get this Dark Universe going. It was supposed to launch with Dracula Untold and a Frankenstein film but, those didn’t work either.
It’s a real try-hard attempt! I can’t see it working at all.
Not overly sure about all these big shared universe movies, sometimes its better just leaving it be.
E
Haven’t seen this one yet, but most of the reviews have pretty much been very bad. Real shame as I usually like films like this. I’ll probably watch this at some point, but not in a real hurry to do so now 😊
Hey buddy put this one way down on the bottom of the list ha.
They really failed to ignite this one with anything to recommend it.
E
“It’s not likely you’ll ever hear anyone admit to this but so bad is Cruise’s role and so tired his delivery, that you’ll be wishing for the good old days of Fraser’s antics”
Seriously? Has anyone seen this and *not* openly wished for a return to the 1999 film? That one was fun; this one was only briefly enlivened by Crowe chewing on the scenery with a dodgy Cockney accent.
Yeh I guess Crowe tried ha but not sure how I feel about him doing a solo Dr Jekyll.
The rest of the cast may as well not have shown up.
E
I cringed when I saw the trailer for this movie, and didn’t want to see it then. Reading your review, I’m glad I never went to see it. I grew up on the original Mummy films and they did have a certain charm about them. If anything, it was a fun movie. This one didn’t look appealing at all, just over played. Thank you for confirming my thoughts without even seeing the movie.
Oh the trailers were so so bad!
I remember the cinemas playing them months and months before this film even came up, was so sick of seeing them.
E
I’m not going to lie, I love the silliness of the Brendan Fraiser/Rachel Weiss Mummy films (let’s not talk about the third). This film looked so disappointing in trailers, taking a fantastic adventure movie concept and making it dark, gritty and generic. Reading reviews made me very glad I gave it a miss.
Also, your review made me laugh out loud a bunch of times, and is awesome. 🙂
Yeh I am a big fan of the first two Fraser Mummy films, they are just a heck of a lot of fun!
Glad this review made you laugh as the film certainly will not ha 🙂
E
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