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The Mummy: Widescreen Collector's Edition ('99) - DVD
Writers: Stephen sommers, Lloyd Fonvielle and Kevin Jarre
Director: Stephen Sommers
Producers: Sean Daniel and James Jacks
Studio: Universal Studios
Characters:
Brendan Fraser - Rick O'Connell
Rachel Weisz - Evelyn
Arnold Vosloo - Imhotep
Features: Chapter Search, Includes "Gangsta's Paradise" Performed By Coolio, Widescreen 1.85:1, ENGLISH: Dolby Digital 5.1 [CC], FRENCH: Dolby Digital Surround
Review:
I never got around to seeing The Mummy when it came out earlier this
year, and I'm not really
sure why -- I never thought it looked particularly bad, and I have no
problem with Brendan Fraser. And
hell, I have no problem with Leah Remini (from TV's King of Queens)
either. As it turns out,
though, she's not in the movie -- the female lead is played by Rachel Weisz,
a popular British actress,
from what I hear. Even through the first 30 minutes of the movie I was
thinking that Remini (who is,
I believe, from New York) wasn't doing a very convincing British accent...
Enough of my idiocy, though.
The movie was very well represented by its advertising campaign. The
effects are really impressive, but
definitely have a somewhat cartoony feel; the acting is somewhat campy; the
story is clearly laid out,
predictable, and also somewhat campy. Fortunately for the makers of The
Mummy camp seems not at
all out of place in ancient Egypt.
As one might expect, this is the story of a mummy that is accidentally
resurrected when a group of treasure
hunters finds the lost City of the Dead, Hamunaptra. It just so
happens that this mummy was
formerly the high priest Imhotep, horrendously dispatched when his affair
with the Pharoa's mistress was
found out, forcing a bit of regicide. Basically the deal is this: as the
Mummy consumes the life and/or
soul of each person responsible for resurrecting his corpse, he regains more
of his original physical form
and dramatically increases his power. This is, of course, a problem for our
band of heroes, so antics
ensue.
That's about all I'm going to say about the movie itself, I think. The DVD,
being a Universal Collector's
Edition, deserves a great deal of praise. I am familiar with their DVD's of
The Thing, Out of Sight,
and 12 Monkeys (all of which are magnificent), and this is definitely
on par with earlier efforts.
The sound and video are both excellent. The commentary track features
director Steve Sommers and editor Bob
Ducsay and is extremely interesting (I'm listening to it as I write this
review) -- it combines a great
number of humorous stories and interesting tidbits with more technical
discussions of the special effects
and on-set problems. The commentary, however, is by no means the extent of
the supplemental material.
There is a documentary called "Building a Better Mummy" that weighs in at
just under an hour. It is
primarily special effects stuff, but manages to be quite entertaining even
for those who don't care much
about that sort of thing. ILM and the special effects crew really did a
good job with the film, though
most of the effects are clearly digital (particularly the Scarab (beetle)
animations look questionable).
This is made much less damaging by the aforementioned camp, though, so never
fear. Interestingly, I had
thought the opening shot was about 90% digital, but it's actually a
model with digital overlays, which
really surprised me.
The other extra stuff is at least moderately interesting -- there is some
info on Egyptian mythology, a couple of
Mummy trailers, an uninteresting deleted scene or two, normal cast and crew
bios, some DVD-ROM material
(which I can't look at) and more... There are also a couple of short
special effects demos with commentary
from the Visual Effects supervisor John Berton as well as trailers for the
upcoming Universal films For
the Love of the Game and Arnold's new film End of Days.
I didn't exactly fall in love with this movie, but then again it's not
really my sort of thing. Despite my
own feelings, I do not feel any reservations about recommending this DVD to
pretty much everybody. Great
cinema The Mummy is not (what do you expect from the writer/director
of Deep Rising), but it
is definitely entertaining. At the time of this writing, this film is
available for pre-order from
Reel.com
for $17.99 (available Sept. 28th), and it really is worth it, considering
the amount of supplemental material offered.
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