The
Mummy Returns
(2001)
Rated: PG-13
Runtime: 2 Hours and 10 Minutes
Reviewer: Dale
Grade: BI didn't expect a whole lot out of the first "Mummy". Then again, did anyone really expect a lot out of it with "Star Wars: Episode 1" lurking on the horizon? Imagine my surprise, then, when the original "Mummy" was actually the entertaining thrill ride that the Star Wars prequel only hoped to be. So this time, I was anxiously awaiting the sequel to "The Mummy". The first one was one of the most fun times at the movies that I have had in recent memory. It was just sheer, relentless entertainment from beginning to end. It wasn't Shakespeare, but it understood the delicate balance of tone, the place somewhere between cheesiness and seriousness that a movie like this must inhabit. A movie like "The Mummy" is perhaps even more difficult, as far as tone goes, than a "real" movie. It can so easily become an exercise in audience manipulation. It can so easily leave you disappointed and wanting more. Because it can't just rely on great subject matter like a "real" movie can. It has to provide satisfaction. A "real" movie has to satisfy but if, like a Kubrick movie, you don't really understand it fully or agree with it, you can at least be stimulated by the ideas and events of the narrative and perhaps think upon them later. Without such subject matter or challenging ideas, it becomes imperative to serve the audience precisely what it wants. This is a much riskier place to tread, if you ask me, because even the movies of this sort that work well work on a level of popular consciousness, almost. They work on a plane that is nearly intangible. It takes more than just some neat explosions or a good plot (sometimes neither of these is imperative). It takes charm, damnit. "The Mummy" was not the greatest film ever made, but it had charm. It seemed to understand that it was not going to be "Raiders of the Lost Ark". It had come to accept this. So it was satisfied (and satisfying) just being itself. It was fun and the characters were amusing and worth rooting for and it provided a fair share of laughs.
"The Mummy Returns" has that same charm, but it is waning a bit in the second installment.
The plot is pretty shaky. The first one didn't have a lot of plot, but at least it was straightforward. It knew what it was doing, knew where it was going, knew how to get there.
Period. Good enough, if you ask me. The blueprint was there and it worked. The second one has both too much plot and not enough. It's about preventing the apocalypse, again. Although you aren't entirely sure how. I was never sure how, not that it really bothered me. I soon succumbed to the pleasures of the film and gave my brain a rest, but I would have liked a little something to work with. When they tried to explain the workings of this, I just got confused. That is why I just cast my brain aside. I'll pick it up again when I go see "A.I." or "Pollock". However, I probably won't be using it for "Jurassic Park 3" or "Dr. Doolittle 2".
The two things I was most worried about going into this film were The Rock and the kid.
You see, The Rock plays a guy named the Scorpion King, who, uh, controlled a bunch of demons...or something. I thought he would have all the acting talent of a two-by-four, but he wasn't all that bad. Oh, don't get me wrong, he isn't Laurence Olivier. But at least he isn't Steven Seagal. So count your blessings. The kid? Well, you see, it's been several years since the events of the first film and Brendan and Rachel's characters are now married with a child.
I expected the child to be just as annoying as every other cute kid character in a movie like this (Yes, "Jurassic Park", I am talking about you). But I was pleasantly surprised. I actually liked the kid in this movie. Not only was he not a distraction, he actually ADDED to the film.
Cool.
Brendan Fraser does a great job, once again, of being a tough guy and a wise ass. He needs to do more movies like this and less movies like "Bedazzled". He is charming and funny and dashing all at once. You try it, it's not as easy as Brendan makes it seem. He is a very underrated and tremendously gifted guy, and these two movies prove it. Rachel Weisz is once again a delicious surprise in this film. She is sweet, bumbling and utterly adorable. She also proves, this time, that she is capable of kicking a fair share of ass. Why this woman isn't in more movies is beyond me. She is one of the more captivating females in modern film. And one of the most beautiful. (Okay, so I'm a teensy bit smitten.) I was also happy to see John Hannah return as her drunken, ne'er do well brother Jonathan. This guy is a great assistance to any scene he appears in. And the Mummy does, well, basically what he did the first time.
Whatever you call that.
The tone is also maintained once again. The little touches are what makes these movies rise head and shoulders above other summer popcorn fare. The pygmy warriors, for example.
They were a magnificent and fiendishly clever touch. And I loved the shootout in the museum and subsequent fight on a double-decker bus. Those were the action highlights of the film (aside from the marvelous pygmy warriors, that is, and their scene involving a tree bridge and a stick of lit dynamite). The end battles have their moments and the dirigible is a nice touch, though one scene where they are fleeing from a wall of water owes a little too much to a similar scene involving a cloud of sand in the first film.
The downside of the film, however, is that it seems a bit too contrived. Rather than flowing naturally, the film has a general feeling of being too constructed, too forced for its own good.
"The Mummy" had a spontaneous, effortless feel of fun about it. This one often has that, but a lot of it could have used a bit more of that naturalism. Another quibble? The movie was a little too long ( I would have cut five minutes or so). The special effects in the film are not as good as the first one, either. A scorpion monster, for example, looks no better than a graphic from a PlayStation game.
Still, it generates more than enough thrills, chills and laughs to make it a well-spent evening at the cinema. It has charm and style and a good production design and it's fun. Isn't that all it should be? Pretty much. The first one gave us a little bit more for our dollar, but this one is an adequate time-waster that succeeds more often than it fails.