Save Me, Tom Cruise; Or, Would You Run From Calista Flockhart?

 

 

THE MUMMY

(2017, Dir: Alex Kurtzman)

✮✮✩✩✩

 

As a belated Mother's Day gift, I took my Mom to the movies yesterday. But since she's already seen Wonder Woman and I don't want her to catch me lusting after Zac Efron & The Rock in Baywatch, we decide to see Tom Cruise in The Mummy reboot. 😬

From the trailers, this film looks like it will provide a much darker take on the mummy tale than the Brendan Fraser trilogy. Since my biggest complaint about those movies was that they were too campy and Fraser wasn't a believable action star, surely legitimate leading man Tom Cruise (Top Gun, Mission:Impossible, Risky Business) will change all that, right?

 

WRONG. 😩 Even though Kurtzman's version is a modern retelling of Universal Studios' 1932 horror classic, it is not remotely scary. He confusingly tries to combine action, laughs, and "scares" to create a well-rounded blockbuster; instead, it's just a big ol' mess. 

 

Frankly, Tom Cruise isn't funny. With the exception of Tropic Thunder (in which Tom is basically unrecognizable), he should stay far away from comedic roles. On top of this, the film's chronic lack of character development makes it difficult to pin down Tom's character and his motivations: Is he a petty thief? A mercenery? A tomb raider? An American soldier? It's never clear.

While raiding tombs in Iraq, Tom's character accidentally discovers the sarcophagus of Princess Ahmanet (played by Sofia Boutella), an ancient Egyptian princess mummified alive for making a pact with the God of Death and slaughtering her entire family in hopes of usurping the throne. Her backstory is the most compelling element of the film and I only wish she had more screen time; plus, I love how she is serving up Dark Willow realness as she terrorizes London. 💁🔮

 

The movie is off to a decent start but about halfway through, it flies off the rails in every way imaginable. At one point, a gang of zombies are chasing Tom Cruise underwater and Mom literally YELLS at the screen, "Now THAT can't happen!" 🙄🙄🙄 And I just turn to her like, You have no problem with Tom Cruise resurrecting a 16,000 year old woman, but swimming zombies is where you cross the line? 🏊🏊 Oh well, I'm just glad she has a line. You have to walk into action & horror movies with a reasonable suspension of disbelief; otherwise, I'd never believe that anyone could be scared of mummies, ghosts, demon clowns, or 5-lb stuffed dolls.

 

Overall, the special effects are decent and the acting is convincing, given the ludicrous source material. The Mummy's fatal flaw is its messy convoluted narrative that raises more questions than it answers:

Is it action, comedy, or horror?

Are we supposed to like, hate or pity the Mummy?

Why the hell are Dr Jekyll & Hyde in this?

The film's climax is bleak, non-sensical, abrupt and sets up a sequel to this remake... neither of which anyone asked for. 😒 Y'all know I can appreciate an awesomely bad movie, but this movie is just genuinely bad and a total waste of time. SKIP IT!