The Mummy (1999 film)

The Mummy

Promotional poster
Directed by Stephen Sommers
Produced by Sean Daniel
James Jacks
Written by Screenplay:
Stephen Sommers
Story:
Kevin Jarre
Lloyd Fonvielle
Stephen Sommers
Starring Brendan Fraser
Rachel Weisz
John Hannah
Arnold Vosloo
Music by Jerry Goldsmith
Cinematography Adrian Biddle, BSC
Editing by Bob Ducsay
Distributed by Universal Studios
Release date(s) May 7, 1999
Running time 124 minutes
Country Flag of the United States.svg United States
Language English, Arabic
Budget $80,000,000 (estimated)
Gross revenue Domestic:
$155,385,488
Worldwide:

$415,933,406
Followed by The Mummy Returns

The Mummy is a 1999 American adventure film written and directed by Stephen Sommers and starring Brendan Fraser, and Rachel Weisz, with Arnold Vosloo in the title role as the reanimated mummy. The film features substantial dialogue in ancient Egyptian language, spoken with the assistance of a professional Egyptologist. It is a loose remake of the 1932 film of the same name which starred Boris Karloff in the title role. Originally intended to be part of a low-budget horror series, the movie was eventually turned into a blockbuster adventure film.

Filming began in Marrakech, Morocco, on May 4, 1998, and lasted seventeen weeks; the crew had to endure dehydration, sandstorms, and snakes while filming in the Sahara. The visual effects were provided by Industrial Light & Magic, who blended film and computer-generated imagery to create the titular Mummy. Jerry Goldsmith provided the orchestral score.

The Mummy opened on May 7, 1999, and grossed $43 million in 3,210 theaters; the movie went on to gross $415 million worldwide. Reception to the film was mixed, with reviewers alternatively praising or complaining about the special effects, the slapstick nature of the story and characters, and the stereotyped villains. The box-office success led to a 2001 sequel, The Mummy Returns, as well as The Mummy: The Animated Series, and the prequel film The Scorpion King. Another sequel, The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, opened on August 1, 2008. Universal Studios also opened a roller coaster, Revenge of the Mummy, in 2004. The movie and its sequel's novelizations were written by Max Allan Collins.

Contents

Plot

The movie begins in Egypt, circa 1290 BC. High priest Imhotep is having an affair with Anck-su-namun, the mistress of Pharaoh Seti I. When the Pharaoh discovers this, Imhotep and Anck-su-namun murder the monarch. Anck-su-namun then kills herself, intending for Imhotep to resurrect her. After Anck-su-namun's burial, Imhotep breaks into her crypt and steals her corpse. He and his priests flee across the desert to Hamunaptra, the city of the dead, where they begin the resurrection ceremony. However, they are caught by Seti's guards before the ritual can be completed, and Anck-su-namun's soul is sent back to the Underworld.

As punishment for their sacrilege, Imhotep's priests are mummified alive, and Imhotep himself is forced to endure the curse of Hom Dai: his tongue is cut out, and he is buried alive, wrapped like a mummy, along with a swarm of flesh-eating scarabs. The horror of the ritual is that it grants eternal life, forcing him to endure the agony of his wounds for all time. He is buried under high security, sealed away in a sarcophagus below a statue of the Egyptian god Anubis, and kept under strict surveillance by the Medjai, descendants of Seti's palace guards. If Imhotep were ever to be released, the powers that made him immortal would allow him to unleash a wave of destruction and death upon the Earth.

Three thousand years later in 1923, an American, Rick O'Connell, is serving as a captain in a unit of the French Foreign Legion, which travels to Hamunaptra in search of the treasure rumored to be there. When they reach the fabled city, a group of Arabs attack. Left in charge when the unit's commanding officer deserts during the battle, Rick retreats into the city when the Arabs overrun his unit. Surrounded by his attackers, O'Connell thinks he will be killed, but suddenly the attackers flee. A confused Rick suddenly hears a disembodied voice and appears to be attacked by the sand, which forms into a face as he flees. He is left to wander out of the desert; unknown to him, the battle was witnessed by a group of the Medjai.

Three years later, Cairo librarian and aspiring Egyptologist, Evelyn "Evie" Carnahan is presented with an intricate box and map by her bumbling brother Jonathan, who says he found it in Thebes. After observing the map leads to Hamunaptra, Jonathan reveals he actually stole it from Rick, who is currently in prison. After they contact him, Rick makes a deal with Evelyn to reveal the location of Hamunaptra, in exchange for Evelyn striking a deal with the warden to keep Rick from being hanged. Rick upholds his bargain and leads an expedition to Hamunaptra, where Rick's group encounters a band of treasure hunters led by the famed Egyptologist Dr. Allen Chamberlain and guided by Beni Gabor, a cowardly former Legion soldier who served with Rick and also knows the location of the lost city, and whom Rick harbours an intense hatred for, because Beni left him to die during the fight earlier in the film.

Shortly after reaching Hamunaptra, both groups are attacked by the Medjai, led by Ardeth Bey, who warns them of the evil buried in the city. Rather than heed Bey's warning, the two expeditions continue to excavate in separate portions of the city. Evelyn is looking for the Book of Amon-Ra, a golden book capable of taking life away, but unexpectedly comes across the remains of Imhotep instead; much to her shock, Imhotep's corpse is actually a still-decomposing skeleton instead of a preserved mummy. The team of Americans, meanwhile, discover a box containing the black Book of the Dead, accompanied by canopic jars carrying Anck-su-namun's preserved organs; each of the Americans takes a jar as loot.

At night, Evelyn takes the Book of the Dead from the Americans' tent and reads a page aloud, accidentally awakening Imhotep. Although both groups return to Cairo, the mummy hunts down the Americans who opened the box, slowly regenerating with each person he kills. Beni survives a meeting with Imhotep by pledging allegiance to him and helps him track down the Americans and the canopic jars in Cairo. Evelyn hypothesises that if the Book of the Dead brought Imhotep back to life, the Book of Amon-Ra can kill the high priest once again; soon after this, Evelyn is captured by Imhotep, who intends to sacrifice her to resurrect Anck-su-namun, and so they return to Hamunaptra. Rick and Jonathan rescue Evelyn after an intense battle with Imhotep's mummies. Evelyn reads from the Book of Amon-Ra, which takes away Imhotep's immortality, and Rick mortally wounds him. Quickly decaying, Imhotep leaves the world of the living, but not before vowing revenge.

As they are leaving, Beni accidentally sets off an ancient booby trap and is trapped by a swarm of flesh-eating scarabs as Hamunaptra collapses, which devour him in the darkness (Beni's fate is very ironic as he died in the treasure room, where money is what he gluttoned for the entire film). The heroes escape and ride off into the sunset on a pair of camels, unaware that their saddlebags are packed with the treasures that Beni looted earlier.

Cast

See also: Characters related to The Mummy (1999 film)

Production

Origins

In 1992, producer James Jacks decided to update the original Mummy film for the 1990s.[5] Universal Studios gave him the go-ahead, but only if he kept the budget around $10 million.[1] The producer remembers that the studio "essentially wanted a low-budget horror franchise";[1] in response, Jacks recruited horror filmmaker/writer Clive Barker on-board to direct. Barker's vision for the film was violent, with the story revolving around the head of a contemporary art museum who turns out to be a cultist trying to reanimate mummies.[6][5] Jacks recalls that Barker's take was "dark, sexual and filled with mysticism",[1] and that, "it would have been a great low-budget movie".[6] After several meetings, Barker and Universal lost interest and parted company. Filmmaker George A. Romero was brought in with a vision of a zombie-style horror movie similar to Night of the Living Dead, but this was considered too scary by Jacks and the studio, who wanted a more accessible picture.[1]

Joe Dante was the next choice, increasing the budget for his idea of Daniel Day-Lewis as a brooding Mummy.[1] This version (co-written by John Sayles) was set in contemporary times and focused on reincarnation with elements of a love story.[6] It came close to being made with some elements, like the flesh-eating scarabs, making it to the final product.[5] However, at that point, the studio wanted a film with a budget of $15 million and rejected Dante's version. Soon after, Mick Garris was attached to direct but eventually left the project,[7] and Wes Craven was offered the film but turned it down.[6] Then, Stephen Sommers called Jacks in 1997 with his vision of The Mummy "as a kind of Indiana Jones or Jason and the Argonauts with the mummy as the creature giving the hero a hard time".[1] Sommers had seen the original film when he was eight, and wanted to recreate the things he liked about it on a bigger scale.[8] He had wanted to make a Mummy film since 1993, but other writers or directors were always attached. Finally, Sommers received his window of opportunity and pitched his idea to Universal with an 18-page treatment.[5] At the time, Universal's management had changed in response to the box office failure of Babe: Pig in the City, and the loss led the studio to want to revisit its successful franchises from the 1930s.[9] Universal liked this idea so much that they approved the concept and increased the budget from $15 million to $80 million.[10]

Principal photography

Filming began in Marrakech, Morocco on May 4, 1998 and lasted 17 weeks. Photography then moved to the Sahara desert outside the small town of Erfoud, and then to the United Kingdom before completion of shooting on August 29, 1998.[11] The crew could not shoot in Egypt because of the unstable political conditions.[12] To avoid dehydration in the scorching heat of the Sahara, the production's medical team created a drink that the cast and crew had to consume every two hours.[3] Sandstorms were daily inconveniences. Snakes, spiders and scorpions were a major problem, with many crew members having to be airlifted out after being bitten.[12]

Brendan Fraser nearly died during a scene where his character is hanged. Weisz remembered, "He [Fraser] stopped breathing and had to be resuscitated."[4] The production had the official support of the Moroccan army, and the cast members had kidnapping insurance taken out on them,[6] a fact Sommers disclosed to the cast only after shooting had finished.[2]

Production Designer Allan Cameron found a dormant volcano near Erfoud where the entire set for Hamunaptra could be constructed. Sommers liked the location because, "A city hidden in the crater of an extinct volcano made perfect sense. Out in the middle of the desert you would never see it. You would never think of entering the crater unless you knew what was inside that volcano."[11] A survey of the volcano was conducted so that an accurate model and scale models of the columns and statues could be replicated back at Shepperton Studios, where all of the scenes involving the underground passageways of the City of the Dead were shot. These sets took 16 weeks to build, and included fiberglass columns rigged with special effects for the movie's final scenes.[11] Another large set was constructed in the United Kingdom on the dockyard at Chatham which doubled for the Giza Port on the River Nile. This set was 600 feet (183 m) in length and featured "a steam train, an Ajax traction engine, three cranes, an open two-horse carriage, four horse-drawn carts, five dressing horses and grooms, nine pack donkeys and mules, as well as market stalls, Arab-clad vendors and room for 300 costumed extras".[11]

Special effects

The filmmakers reportedly spent $15 million of the $80 million budget on special effects, provided by Industrial Light & Magic;[13][14] the producers wanted a new look for the Mummy so that they would avoid comparisons to past movies.[13] John Andrew Berton, Jr., Industrial Light & Magic's Visual Effects Supervisor on The Mummy, started developing the look three months before filming started. He said that he wanted the Mummy "to be mean, tough, nasty, something that had never been seen by audiences before". Berton used motion capture in order to achieve "a menacing and very realistic Mummy".[11] Specific photography was conducted on actor Arnold Vosloo so that the special effects crew could see exactly how he moved and replicate it.[13]

To create the Mummy, Berton used a combination of live action and computer graphics. Then, he matched the digital prosthetic make-up pieces on Vosloo's face during filming. Berton said, "When you see his film image, that's him. When he turns his head and half of his face is missing and you can see right through on to his teeth, that's really his face. And that's why it was so hard to do."[11] Vosloo described the filming as a "whole new thing" for him; "They had to put these little red tracking lights all over my face so they could map in the special effects. A lot of the time I was walking around the set looking like a Christmas tree."[2] Make-Up Effects Supervisor Nick Dudman produced the physical creature effects in the film, including three-dimensional make-up and prosthetics. He also designed all of the animatronic effects. While the film made extensive use of computer generated imagery, many scenes, including ones where Rachel Weisz's character is covered with rats and locusts, were real, using live animals.[12]

Soundtrack

The music for The Mummy was composed by Jerry Goldsmith, with additional orchestrations provided by Alexander Courage.[15] The soundtrack was released by Decca Records on May 4, 1999. Like many Goldsmith scores, the main theme uses extensive brass and percussion elements;[16] Goldsmith also used sparing amounts of vocals, highly unusual for most of his work.[16]

Overall, Goldsmith's score was well-received. Allmusic described it as a "grand, melodramatic score" which delivered the expected highlights.[15] Other reviews positively noted the dark, percussive sound meshed well with the plot, as well as the raw power of the music. The limited but masterful use of the chorus was also lauded, and most critics found the final track on the CD to be the best overall.[17][16] On the other hand, some critics found the score lacked cohesion,[18] and that the constant heavy action lent itself to annoying repetition.[16] Roderick Scott off CineMusic.net summed up the score as "representative of both Goldsmith's absolute best and his most mediocre. Thankfully [...] his favourable work on this release wins out."[17]

Reception

The Mummy opened on May 7, 1999 and grossed USD $43 million in 3,210 theaters. The film went on to gross $415 million worldwide (Domestic: $155 million; Foreign: $260 million).[19]

Although its commercial success and popularity with audiences was positive, critical reception was mixed. The Mummy holds a 53 percent "rotten" rating at Rotten Tomatoes[20] and a 48 Metascore at Metacritic.[21] Roger Ebert, a film critic of the Chicago Sun-Times, wrote, "There is hardly a thing I can say in its favor, except that I was cheered by nearly every minute of it. I cannot argue for the script, the direction, the acting or even the mummy, but I can say that I was not bored and sometimes I was unreasonably pleased."[22] Likewise, Owen Gleiberman of Entertainment Weekly gave the film a "B-" rating and said, "The Mummy would like to make you shudder, but it tries to do so without ever letting go of its jocular inconsequentiality."[23] Bob Graham of the San Francisco Chronicle gave the film high marks for the acting as well as the special effects.[24]

Stephen Holden from The New York Times wrote, "This version of The Mummy has no pretenses to be anything other than a gaudy comic video game splashed onto the screen. Think Raiders of the Lost Ark with cartoon characters, no coherent story line and lavish but cheesy special effects. Think Night of the Living Dead stripped of genuine horror and restaged as an Egyptian-theme Halloween pageant. Think Abbott and Costello Meet the Mummy grafted onto a Bing Crosby-Bob Hope road picture (The Road to Hamunaptra?) and pumped up into an epic-size genre spoof."[25] Publications like The Austin Chronicle and Dallas Observer came to the conclusion that despite good acting and special effects, the movie lacked cohesion;[26][27] talking about the special effects, the Observer lamented "If only generating a soul for the film itself were so easy."[26] Other publications such as Jump Cut felt that Industrial Light and Magic's lock on special effects proved detrimental to The Mummy; "The mummy", Ernest Larson wrote for the Jump Cut, "is standard-issue I.L.&M.".[28] Kim Newman of the British Film Institute judged the picture inferior to the original, as all the time was spent on special effects, instead of creating the atmosphere which made the original film such a classic.[29] USA Today gave the film two out of four stars and felt that it was "not free of stereotypes",[30] a sentiment with which the BFI concurred.[29] "If someone complains of a foul odor, you can be sure an Arab stooge is about to enter a scene. Fraser, equally quick with weapon, fist or quip, may save the day, but even he can't save the picture", USA Today wrote.[30]

The Mummy was nominated for Best Sound at the Academy Awards and Best Visual Effects at the BAFTAs, losing both to The Matrix.[31] Jerry Goldsmith won a BMI Film Award for the soundtrack,[32] and the film won Best Make-Up at Saturn Awards, out of nine nominations including Best Fantasy Film.[33] Other nominations included Best Sound Editing at the Motion Picture Sound Editors' Golden Reel Awards, Best Visual Effects at the Golden Satellites[34] and Best Action Sequence on the MTV Movie Awards.[35]

Adaptations

The entrance to Revenge of the Mummy at Universal Studios Hollywood

The Mummy's box office performance led to numerous sequels and spinoffs. In 2001, the sequel The Mummy Returns was released; the film features most of the surviving principal characters, as a married Rick and Evelyn confront Imhotep and the Scorpion King.[36] The film also introduced the heroes' son, Alex.[36] The two films inspired both an animated series which lasted two seasons, and a spin-off prequel, The Scorpion King (2002), telling the story of the Akkadian warrior as he was crowned king.

A second sequel, called The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor. was released on August 1, 2008. The story takes place in China, with Rachel Weisz being replaced with Maria Bello.[37][38] A prequel to The Scorpion King, The Scorpion King 2: Rise of a Warrior, was released direct-to-DVD.

Two video game adaptations of The Mummy were published by Konami and Universal Interactive in 2000: a beat 'em up for the PlayStation and PC developed by Rebellion Developments,[39] as well as a Game Boy Color puzzle game developed by Konami Nagoya.[40] The film also inspired a roller coaster, Revenge of the Mummy in two Universal Studios Theme Parks, Hollywood and Orlando.

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6 1.7 1.8 Hobson, Louis B (May 1, 1999). "Universal rolls out new, improved Mummy", Calgary Sun. 
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 Staff (1999-05-14). "Show Me The Mummy (page 2)". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved on 2008-04-01.
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 Braund, Simon (July 1999). "Equally Cursed and Blessed", Empire. 
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 Jones, Alison (June 26, 1999). "Great Excavations", The Birmingham Post. 
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 5.3 "The Mummy That Wasn't", Cinescape (May 3, 1999). 
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 6.3 6.4 Slotek, Jim (May 2, 1999). "Unwrapping The Mummy", Toronto Sun. 
  7. ↑ Chase, Donald (May 3, 1999). "What Have They Unearthed?", Los Angeles Times. 
  8. ↑ Snead, Elizabeth (May 7, 1999). "Updating A Well-Preserved Villain", USA Today. 
  9. ↑ Bonin, Liane (1999-05-07). "That's a Wrap". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved on 2008-04-01.
  10. ↑ Argent, Daniel. "Unwrapping The Mummy: An Interview with Stephen Sommers", Creative Screenwriting. 
  11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 11.2 11.3 11.4 11.5 "Behind the Scenes". The Mummy Official Site. Universal Studios (1999). Retrieved on 2007-05-24.
  12. ↑ 12.0 12.1 12.2 Portman, Jamie (May 5, 1999). "Mummy Unearths Horror, Humour", Ottawa Citizen. 
  13. ↑ 13.0 13.1 13.2 Shay, Estelle (April 1999). "Thoroughly modern Mummy". Cinefex (77): 71–76. "On the special effects used in the film, and on the company who made them, Industrial Light & Magic.". 
  14. ↑ Slotek, Jim (1999-05-09). "Mummy Unwraps a New Fraser "Cartoon" Character", Toronto Sun. 
  15. ↑ 15.0 15.1 "Allmusic: The Mummy (1999 Original Score)". Allmusic. Retrieved on 2008-02-12.
  16. ↑ 16.0 16.1 16.2 16.3 "The Mummy (Jerry Goldsmith) Soundtrack Review". ScoreReviews.com. Retrieved on 2008-01-01.
  17. ↑ 17.0 17.1 Coleman, Christopher (2000). "The Mummy by Jerry Goldsmith". TrackSounds.com. Retrieved on 2008-02-21.
  18. ↑ "The Mummy: Editorial Review". FilmTracks.net. Retrieved on 2008-02-21.
  19. ↑ "The Mummy". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved on 2006-11-28.
  20. ↑ "The Mummy". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved on 2007-06-24.
  21. ↑ "The Mummy: Reviews". Metacritic. Retrieved on 2007-06-24.
  22. ↑ Ebert, Roger (1999-05-07). "The Mummy", Chicago Sun-Times. Retrieved on 2006-11-29. 
  23. ↑ Gleiberman, Owen (May 7, 1999). "The Mummy", Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved on 2006-12-19. 
  24. ↑ Graham, Bob (1999-05-07). "'Mummy' -- It's Alive", San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved on 2008-02-03. 
  25. ↑ Holden, Stephen (May 7, 1999). "Sarcophagus, Be Gone: Night of the Living Undead", The New York Times. Retrieved on 2006-11-29. 
  26. ↑ 26.0 26.1 Hinson, Hal (1999-05-07). "Mummy dearest", Dallas Observer. Retrieved on 2008-03-20. 
  27. ↑ Savlov, Mark (1999-05-07). "The Mummy", The Austin Chronicle. Retrieved on 2008-03-12. 
  28. ↑ Larsen, Ernest (July 2000). "The Mummy: traffic in mummies". Jump Cut (43): 12–15, 128. http://ejumpcut.org/archive/onlinessays/JC43folder/Mummy.html. Retrieved on 2008-04-09. 
  29. ↑ 29.0 29.1 Newman, Kim (1999-06-01). "Sight and Sound: The Mummy". British Film Institute. Retrieved on 2008-04-04.
  30. ↑ 30.0 30.1 Wloszczyna, Susan (May 7, 1999). "Effects New Curse of The Mummy", USA Today. 
  31. ↑ "Film Nominations 1999". British Academy of Film and Television Arts. Retrieved on 2008-04-01.
  32. ↑ Staff (2000-05-15). "BMI Honors Top Film and TV Composers". BMI. Retrieved on 2008-01-04.
  33. ↑ "Past Saturn Awards". Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films. Retrieved on 2008-01-04.
  34. ↑ "2000 4th Annual Satellite™ Awards". International Press Academy. Retrieved on 2008-01-04.
  35. ↑ "2000 MTV Movie Awards". MTV. Retrieved on 2008-01-04.
  36. ↑ 36.0 36.1 Travers, Peter (2001-05-09). "The Mummy Returns". Rolling Stone. Retrieved on 2008-04-01.
  37. ↑ Garrett, Diane; Fleming, Michael (2007-04-11). "Fraser returns for 'Mummy 3'", Variety. Retrieved on 2007-04-12. 
  38. ↑ Fleming, Michael (2007-05-13). "Bello replaces Weisz in 'Mummy'", Variety. Retrieved on 2007-05-13. 
  39. ↑ "The Mummy (PSX)". IGN. Retrieved on 2008-02-21.
  40. ↑ "The Mummy (GBC)". GameSpot. Retrieved on 2008-02-21.

External links

The Mummy franchise
Universal series
The Mummy (1932) • The Mummy's Hand (1940) • The Mummy's Tomb (1942) • The Mummy's Ghost (1944) • The Mummy's Curse (1944) • Abbott and Costello Meet the Mummy (1955)
Hammer series
The Mummy (1959) • The Curse of the Mummy's Tomb (1964) • The Mummy's Shroud (1967) • Blood from the Mummy's Tomb (1971)
Remake series
The Mummy (1999) • The Mummy Returns (2001) • The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor (2008)
Spinoff series
The Scorpion King (2002) • The Scorpion King 2: Rise of a Warrior (2008)
Characters
Kharis • Rick O'Connell • Evelyn Carnahan-O'Connell • Jonathan Carnahan • Alexander O'Connell • Other Characters
Related topics
The Mummy: The Animated Series (2001) • Revenge of the Mummy (Florida) • Revenge of the Mummy (Hollywood)
Films directed by Stephen Sommers

The Adventures of Huck Finn (1993) • The Jungle Book (1994) • Deep Rising (1998) • The Mummy (1999) • The Mummy Returns (2001) • Van Helsing (2004) • G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra (2009)
Preceded by
Life		 Box office number-one films of 1999 (USA)
May 9, 1999 – May 16, 1999		 Succeeded by
Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace