And so the Summer movie season of 2001 is launched and appropriately it is kicked off with a sequel. The Mummy Returns and with it comes the big budget, special effects heavy, high adventure movies that we've all come to associate with the Summer blockbuster.
The Mummy Returns takes place 8 years after the original. Evie and Rick are married and have a son, but this hasn't slowed down their adventuring, as we see in the opening, when they uncover the bracelet of the Scorpion King. This leads to a plan to resurrect the Mummy from the first movie so that he can battle the Scorpion King and take control of his army and destroy the world. Of course the O'Connells can't let this happen, and there, in a nutshell, is the plot of the movie.
But who cares about plot!?! In this movie, plot is just a way of explaining how to move from one action scene to the next. And there is some good action going on here. There's a double-decker bus ride through the streets of London, complete as all bus rides should be, with a battle with the undead. There's bugs, and pygmy mummies, chases, spills, thrills, tidal waves, and armies battling armies. This movie is loaded with computer generated action sequences.
The problem with all of this action is, that no matter what the situation, I never felt that any of the main characters were in danger. It was almost like a cartoon. A big budget, partially live-action, cartoon where no matter what happens, you just know that no one is going to die.
This movie has no edge. Maybe that's what it was trying for, to create a family-friendly adventure movie that you wouldn't be afraid to take your kids to see. If that is what the makers of this movie wanted, then they succeeded royally. It's a fun movie to watch, if you can check your skepticism at the door.
Personally, I wasn't that big a fan of the first Mummy movie. It seemed like a big budget 'B' movie and so does this one. In this one, I found the boy annoying, the plot full of holes, and as I said before, a lack of danger and suspense leading to a movie without punch.
As an example of a plot hole, just to show you what I mean, a revelation is made in this film regarding Evie's past and her relationship to Anck-Su-Namun. It was an interesting revelation and made in a flashback to ancient Egypt and is nicely woven with scenes taken straight from the first movie. Hence the problem. This interesting revelation has such bearing on the characters of Imhotep and Anck-Su-Namun, that surely this revelation would have been mentioned in the first movie!
Maybe I'm just a jaded movie reviewer, and maybe this is just a Summer action movie during which I am supposed to check my mind at the door and just sit back and relax, but I couldn't really. I wish I'd seen this movie when I was ten. I think I would have loved it then. However, I'm not ten anymore, and as an adult I just expect more from movies than I did when I was a kid.
I expect that this movie will do quite well at the box office and deservedly so. People who loved the first movie, will love this one as well. It will entertain many people. And even I can't say that I wasn't entertained by parts of it. They got many things right when making this movie. The effects are quite good. I like the way they matured the relationship between Rick and Evie, they are no longer bickering, but rather deeply in love and supportive of each other. The actors all do a good job, although don't expect any Academy Awards for acting, this is just not that kind of film, and there are, as in the first, some funny moments as well.
So to sum up this meandering review, let me just say that this movie is slickly packaged entertainment of the kind that won't tax your brain and is gentle on the eyes. A movie that succeeds in everything it sets out to do, just personally, I wish they'd set out to do a little more.
