HAVING your own universe of characters to draw from seems a prerequisite for every movie studio these days.
Marvel have Iron Man and Thor, DC Comics have Batman and Superman, and now Universal are launching their Dark Universe franchise with ‘The Mummy’.
Known for their horror movies of the 1920s and beyond, Universal has previously had hits with such famous characters as Dracula, the Wolf Man and Frankenstein’s monster.
There have of course been a number of different incarnations of the embalmed Egyptian corpse over the years, with horror greats like Peter Cushing and Boris Karloff starring.
The turn of the century saw Brendan Frasier taking the lead in a reboot trilogy that relied more on comedy than its predecessors, and now with heavyweight Tom Cruise on board, Universal are clearly convinced there is more mileage left in the old cadaver.
The story bursts out of the blocks with an entertaining first half hour where we meet Nick Morton (Cruise) and his buddy Chris who play a couple of rogue US Army soldiers based in the Middle East.
The friends are more interested in unearthing and stealing valuable artefacts than doing their jobs, and when they stumble upon the remains of an ancient burial ground belonging to a malevolent Egyptian princess, little do they know the evil they are about to unleash.
The opening action ends with a spectacular sequence set on a military plane that is thrilling to watch, but after this point, the movie takes somewhat of a nosedive.
As with many films that don’t quite work, there is a problem with tone at the heart of it. Not sure whether to play it as a full on horror or an outright comedy, the film falls between two stools, and the appearance of Russell Crowe as Dr Jekyll feels like it’s crowbarred in as a way to introduce another character from the dark universe.
Overall there is just about enough here to justify the ticket price, but it could have been so much more. We score it an average, 2.5 out of 5 stars.
Paul O’Rourke
