Dom Robinson reviews
Distributed by
Columbia TriStar
Cat.no: UDR 90037
Cert: 15
Running time: 120 minutes
Year: 1999
Pressing: 1999
Region(s): 2, PAL
Chapters: 18 plus extras
Sound: Dolby Digital 5.1
Languages: English, German
Subtitles: 11 languages available
Widescreen: 2.35:1
16:9-Enhanced: Yes
Macrovision: Yes
Disc Format: DVD 9
Price: £19.99
Extras : Scene index, Theatrical trailer, Biographies, Filmographies,
Production Notes, Booklet, Director's Commentary, "Building a Better Mummy"
documentary, 3 Deleted Scenes, Visual and Special Effects Formation Featurette,
Egyptology 101, DVD-ROM elements including "The Mummy" game.
Director:
(The Adventures of Huck Finn (1993), Catch Me If You Can, Deep Rising, The Jungle Book (1994) )
Producers:
James Jacks and Sean Daniel
Screenplay:
Music:
Cast:
Rick O'Connell: Brendan Fraser (Airheads, Blast From the Past, California Man, Dudley Do-Right, George of the Jungle, Gods and Monsters, In the Army Now, Kids in the Hall: Brain Candy, Now and Then, School Ties, Son in Law )
Evelyn 'Evy' Carnaham: Rachel Weisz (Amy Foster, Chain Reaction, The Land Girls, Stealing Beauty, TV: My Summer with Des )
Jonathan Carnaham: John Hannah (The Final Cut, Four Weddings and a Funeral, The Innocent Sleep, The James Gang, Resurrection Man, Sliding Doors )
Imhotep: Arnold Vosloo (Darkman 2 & 3, 1492: Conquest of Paradise, Hard Target, The Progeny, TV: American Gothic, Nash Bridges )
Beni: Kevin J. O'Connor (Accidental Hero, Amistad, Canadian Bacon, Chicago Cab, Color of Night, Deep Rising, Equinox, F/X 2, No Escape, Peggy Sue Got Married, Steel Magnolias, Virtuosity )
Egyptologist: Jonathan Hyde (Anaconda, Being Human, Caravaggio, Deadly Advice, Jumanji, Richie Rich, Titanic )
The Mummy
After an unseen contretemps between the hero of the film, Rick O'Connell
(Brendan Fraser ) and Jonathan Carnaham (John Hannah ) over a
magic key, the former has been languishing in jail for a fair while. He is
only released when he promises to Carnaham's sister, Evy, an English girl
with a posh jolly-hockey-sticks accent, that he knows the way to Hamunaptra,
the City of the Dead and home to the tomb of Imhotep (Arnold Vosloo )
after his life took a most unfortunate turn as noted in the opening pre-title
scene.
What follows is a gung-ho action-adventure with our intrepid crew setting
off to see what there is to see, accompanied by the prison guard who let
O'Connell go after being promised a cut of the final profits, who is played
by Omid Dhalili , most recently seen on the small screen as the cafe
owner in Channel 4's excellent sitcom Small Potatoes , which also starred
Tommy Tiernan and Emma Rydal . Also along for the ride are
an Egyptologist (Jonathan Hyde ) and one of life's irritants for
O'Connell, Beni (Kevin J. O'Connor , who also appeared in director
Stephen Sommers ' Deep Rising ).
When they arrive at their destination, all hell breaks loose, literally,
as Imhotep is inadvertantly risen from the dead 3000 years after his entombment
and threatens to bring civilisation crashing down to his level, but only after
he's brought his girlfriend back from the dead. Will he succeed or will he be
slapped back down to Earth like the nasty man he is? It doesn't take a genius
to work that one out, but note that they'll all be back for another crack of
the whip as the four main characters have been signed up for next year's
sequel, provisionally titled, The Mummy 2 . Original, eh?
If you've seen the trailer or clips from the film before now, it may appear
to be more of an update on Raiders of the Lost Ark , with the powerful
forces of the Ark replaced by the powerful forces of the Mummy. I wouldn't
like to draw too many comparisons, so I'll say no more than the fact that
each have a roughneck hero who dishes out one-liners and initially appears
uninterested in the girl until later on, a girl who appears only to have her
own interests at heart for most of the time until later on and a hanger-on
in the form of a toffee-noses Englishman, taking the place of the late
Denholm Elliott . There's also a moment that hails back to the
Staff of Ra, but not carried out as impressively.
Imhotep's girlfriend approaches
Anamorphic picture, original widescreen ratio of 2.35:1 and some unbelievable
special FX including sandstorms that have more to them than initially meets
the eye, rotting flesh that looks positively disgusting but its success only
champions its cleverness and little scarabs that make mincemeat out of
anything. The average bitrate is a fine 5.65Mb/s, briefly peaking over 8Mb/s.
The sound is presented in Dolby Digital 5.1 for English and German dialogue,
contains a rousing score from Jerry Goldsmith and has impressive
sound effects galore from the haunting tones and dark atmosphere to sounds of
shootings, explosions and crystal clear dialogue.
A predicament for Evy
Extras :
Chapters and Trailer :
Languages and Subtitles :
And there's more...:
"Building a Better Mummy" : a 48-minute 'making of' documentary with
behind-the-scenes footage and interviews with principal cast and members.
Filmographies, Biographies and Production Notes:
Extensive biographies with accompanying filmographies are available for the
six actors listed at the top of the review plus director Stephen Sommers ,
plus a stack of production notes giving background info to the film including
the fact that the historic dockyard of Chatham doubled as the Sphinx's home,
the Giza Port on the River Nile.
Audio commentary track : A feature-length commentary track from
director Sommers and editor Bob Ducsay .
Deleted scenes : Three brief scenes that didn't make it into the
final cut. They don't enhance the film much, but are a nice addition.
DVD-ROM elements : Electronic postcards, two screensavers and an
interactive "The Mummy" game.
Booklet : providing behind-the-scenes notes and a breakdown of the
disc's contents.
Visual and Special Effects Formation Featurette : This gives a
step-by-step account of four scenes from the film including the opener,
the "Scarab Burial", Brendan and Rachel up against "serious trouble",
Imhotep eating a scarab and a final fight between Brendan and a number of
skeletons that knocks the same from Jason and the Argonauts into a
cocked hat!
Egyptology 101 : Everything you wanted to know in a fascinating guide
to the subject detailing everything about the Gods, the Immortals, the plagues,
a map of the area featured in the film and the artifacts (antiques, that is,
not the quality of the DVD picture!)
Menu :
The ultimate treasure chest
Overall, if there's two things this film doesn't have going for it, it's
some of the lead actors and the running time. Firstly, Messrs. Fraser and
Weisz can't really act to save their lives and John Hannah doesn't get much
else to do apart from play a one-dimensional Englishman, although Arnold
Vosloo does shine as the evil Imhotep, as he did when playing right-hand
man to Lance Henriksen in John Woo's exceptional Hard Target which is
due for a DVD release in March 2000.
The film does run too long as well. At two hours, I was left wanting for the
description scenes being sliced as they slowed things down. In an ideal world,
seamless branching would've been used to cut these out and have the actors
turn to the camera and say, "Select the short version if you've seen
'Raiders of the Lost Ark'" :)
As for the DVD itself, compared to most Region 2 DVDs it has more to offer
than most but it's missing a trailer and thanks to
Julian K Jerry Goldsmith 's complete, isolated score in 5.1,
which plays as background music to the "Languages" menu on the Region 1 disc.
As such, I've downrated the extras slightly below.
He also notes that the UK disc's trailer is 16:9 and seems to be a "clean"
version of the first trailer on the R1 disc, in that it has blank spaces
where the US version had the date superimposed.
The disc may be worth a rental first if you've seen all the Indiana Jones
films, as the film may not hold too many repeat viewings, but the special
effects are worth a look all by themselves.
As a final note, it's worth a mention that whereas the cinema release was
a 12-certificate with a few seconds of violence and gore exorcised for the
moral good of the nation, the DVD release goes beyond all usual BBFC
comprehension by persuading them to break away from their usual trappings.
As you can see, the picture sleeve states a "Full Uncut Version", which it is,
but I presumed the video was also complete. It now transpires the video is a
censored 12-cert version in both pan-and-scan (P&S) and widescreen variants.
The BBFC stopped giving out dual certificates for the same film with
Die Hard 2 on P&S (15-cert) and WS (18-cert) video, hence the reason
why the subsequent Terminator 2: T1000 Edition was still censored
despite purporting to be the full special edition.
The video box for The Mummy (P&S version) I saw in Asda had a 12-cert
and just a pic of the Mummy's "face" on its own. I wasn't sure if either the
BBFC had changed their minds (since the 15-cert version isn't any sort of
official "director's cut" - which would mean they would treat it as a separate
film) or Asda just had a few standard promo boxes on display.
However, thanks goes to Paul Ellis on the DVD-UK mailing list for confirming
the BBFC's change of heart. You too can join the DVD-UK mailing list by
subscribing at :
www.onelist.com
FILM : ***
PICTURE QUALITY : *****
SOUND QUALITY : *****
EXTRAS : ****½
-------------------------------
OVERALL : ****½
Review copyright © Dominic Robinson, 2000.
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