The Mummy« fails to make a comeback»

Cinema Wednesdays - Hélène Lavoyer

A partner section of « Cinérevue , NeuchVox's film program. Next live: Monday, October 2, 2017, 8:30 pm - 9:00 pm

Universal Pictures, America's oldest production and distribution studio, takes us on a journey of discovery into a «dark universe» accessible in a series of films. This «dark universe» is a creative concept for discovering a cinematic universe of «gods and monsters». The idea is to bring Dracula, Frankenstein's creature and other characters to life in revisited scenarios. The first window into this universe opens with The Mummy, She is best known for the Universal Pictures trilogy, in which Brendan Fraser played the lead role.

And now a new Mummy. Ahmanet (Sofia Boutella) is an ancient Egyptian princess. The pharaoh's only daughter, she feels her destiny as queen slipping away when her brother is unexpectedly born. Mad with rage, she seals a pact with the terrible god Seth that will give her access to the throne. But before she could kill the man whose body was to serve as Set's envelope, Ahmanet was taken prisoner, embalmed and buried alive far from her homeland.

Two thousand years later, the princess' tomb is discovered by Nick (Tom Cruise) and Chris (Jake Johnson), elite members of the U.S. army and hunters of archaeological artefacts. Their path crosses that of Jenny Halsey (Anabelle Wallis), a passionate young archaeologist. While being transported to London, the mummy awakens, and she is desperate to honor her contract and find a human envelope so that Seth can come to life.

This is followed by a spectacular scene of the plane descending at breakneck speed, crashing with the mummy and Nick, who sacrificed himself so that Jenny could parachute out. Deposited in the morgue, Nick is resurrected in Olympic form. Chris's ghost (cursed by the mummy) warns Nick that Ahmanet has chosen him for Seth; she'll stop at nothing. This leads to a series of life-threatening events for Nick and Jenny, with whom he falls in love.

Between two explosions, the viewer is introduced to Dr. Jekyll. Absent from the trilogy that ran from 1999 to 2008, his appearance is a welcome addition to the screenplay; at last we see something new, a risk taken to add a more modern element to the story. But the modern Jekyll is sorely lacking in uniqueness. He fits the stereotype of the mad doctor, obsessed with his work to find a cure for evil, insensitive to the idea of the collateral damage his goal implies... in short, he's far from a unique personality.

While the action scenes are fine and the special effects carefully executed, the blame lies with the characters' fat humor and the tangled plot. The lines that are supposed to be funny are indigestible, and the events follow one another mechanically. It's as if the viewer had no other expectation than to witness a concert of explosions and stunts! The sudden and rather mysterious appearance of Dr. Jekyl and his laboratory is confusing, and the tumultuous events that accumulate in the second half of the film prevent the characters from revealing any personality.

Evil, the good guys' fight against it, love... all these themes, exploited from so many different angles in cinema, come to the fore in The Mummy like a layer of shared lines and actions. It's hard to finish watching the film without regretting having waited for the DVD release. The introduction of the «dark universe» is saved in extremis by a quality aesthetic (we remain impressed by the special effects and make-up) and a convincing Sofia Boutella in her role as the mummy.

Write to the author : lavoyer.helene@gmail.com

Photo credit: © marvelll.fr