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Ok, time for a slightly different take on my movie reviews – comparing a classic, to a remake – or is that a classic remake to a modern-day remake? Or a modern-day classic remake of a classic vs a modern-day remake of a modern-day remake?!
I don’t know. It’s confusing, but Tom Cruise’s latest stunt-filled mayhem is a remake of a remake, with Brendan Fraser’s The Mummy being a remake of the 1932 The Mummy.
Still with me? Good, because thre’ll be a quiz later, and I will need help with the questions, let alone the answers – and just to be even more confusing, there was another filmed called The Mummy released in 1959, though it’s the 1932 film upon which Brendan Fraser’s film is based, and in turn, Tom Cruise’s film is based on Fraser’s film. My comparison is between the Fraser and Cruise editions – so, let’s weigh up!
Firstly, Fraser’s character of Rick O’Connell is a much warmer, friendlier guy than Cruise’s Nick Morton. Part of that lies in the writing, part of it is from Fraser’s natural charm. He and Rachel Weisz have a good chemistry from the word go, and Arnold Vosloo brings a strong presence as the titular Mummy. The 1999 edition harks back to the classic adventure/monster film genre, capturing the spirit of the era, and doesn’t take itself too seriously either. In contrast, Nick Morton (Cruise’s character) is not some roguish figure of charm, but a colder figure, a less likable man, from the start. Sofia Boutella is creepy as the Mummy, there’s no denying that, but not particularly memorable, Annabelle Wallis is Jenny Hasley, an archeologist whose character exists solely to move the story on, and Russell Crowe shows up as an apparently important character, and keystone for the wider universe Universal Studios are trying to build, but he is not exactly amazing in this either.
Even the CGI, whilst better (as it should be, some 18 years on), isn’t as good as it should be. It’s not a huge leap forward from 1999.
In short, for a fun movie that lets you forget your life for a couple of hours, I’d always choose 1999’s The Mummy over the new one!
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Firstly I’m a 47 + happily single guy, who loved the original Universal movies. I must admit I really enjoyed the 1999 remake with Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz, but even to this day I haven’t been able to watch the 2017 remake all the way through. It’s just an abomination. Completely miscast, with a patchy and confusing narrative. The only plus that the the 2017 version has over the 1999 remake is the inclusion of Sofia Boutella as the mummy. She did a credible job but could have been so much better if given a better and more focused narrative.
Some scenes were stolen from American Werewolf in London and just didn’t work at all. Russell Crow, Annabelle Wallis and even Cruise himself came across as wooden and completely out of character for the movie. I’m sure that they could only do their best with what they were given, which is in itself a testimony as to how poor the script writing and direction was to begin with.
I was so looking forward to the creation of the Dark Universe, but so far it has fallen way short of anything even beginning to approach the Marvel Universe franchise. Hell, it doesn’t even come close to the DC Universe, and I don’t rate that at all.
Universal should just start over, use relatively unknown actors, pay more attention to the narrative and not rely so much on special affects. They need to build a story and create more of an atmosphere and use CGI as an accompliment.
Firstly I’m a 47 + happily single guy, who loved the original Universal movies. I must admit I really enjoyed the 1999 remake with Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz, but even to this day I haven’t been able to watch the 2017 remake all the way through. It’s just an abomination. Completely miscast, with a patchy and confusing narrative. The only plus that the the 2017 version has over the 1999 remake is the inclusion of Sofia Boutella as the mummy. She did a credible job but could have been so much better if given a better and more focused narrative.
Some scenes were stolen from American Werewolf in London and just didn’t work at all. Russell Crow, Annabelle Wallis and even Cruise himself came across as wooden and completely out of character for the movie. I’m sure that they could only do their best with what they were given, which is in itself a testimony as to how poor the script writing and direction was to begin with.
I was so looking forward to the creation of the Dark Universe, but so far it has fallen way short of anything even beginning to approach the Marvel Universe franchise. Hell, it doesn’t even come close to the DC Universe, and I don’t rate that at all.
Universal should just start over, use relatively unknown actors, pay more attention to the narrative and not rely so much on special affects. They need to build a story and create more of an atmosphere and use CGI as an accompliment.
After all the negative reviews and word of mouth I decided to skip The Cruise mummy movie, the movie about a mummy not a movie about Tom Cruise mum, I watched it for the likely one and only time a few months back and while I found it passably entertaining for a Sunday evening time filler, it is definitely a rare dud for Cruise honestly the documentary I watched about Scientology the made up religion/cult Cruise is attached to was far scarier.
Maybe 2017 Mummy wasn’t meant to be scary or maybe it was I couldn’t tell, but given that it was supposedly going to serve as a launch pad for their rebooting their own cinematic monster movie universe of the 1950’s which is a thing the Internet tells me really existed. I suspect there was supposed to be just a slither of horror in it
Only for me neither the script, directing nor the acting by themselves or put together can tell you whether its meant to scare or just be an action movie like the 1999 film is a problem, one of its many, many faults.
The characters are all fairly forgettable the set pieces all given away in the trailer and honestly nothing compared to 99 film, it’s not even as good or competently made as the I thought rubbish sequels to the Brendan Fraser mummy movie, it’s just a film that exists and that singlehandedly killed the dark universe thing it was meant to launch.
I’m sure Russell Crowe had fun haming it up as Jekyll and Hyde and Sofia Boutella got to expand her presence a bit more, TC’s sidekicks the guy who gets killed early on or the blonde woman are worth remembering or caring about.
Neither really is Tom Cruise, he just doesn’t fit in here there was nothing to like about him or was he really worth hating he was just kind of there. I honestly think some other actor might have at least been able to breathe a bit of life into the character of lead guy and show us in some small way what the audience is meant to feel about Nick whatshisname, unusually Tom fails to do even that much.
Still at least it’s done and can simply fade away unlike the Jurassic Park franchise which sadly movie executives won’t just let die peacefully while it still has a shred of the dignity it has left clinging to the knowledge that Steven Spielberg launched it.