THE MUMMY RETURNS
Reviewed by Phil Tucker
129mins - Director : Stephen Sommers Starring - Brendan Fraser, Rachel Weisz, John Hannah
REVIEW - Stephen Sommers invokes the mighty dollar to resurrect the powerful formula of his first Mummy effort, and unleash it pretty much unchanged upon a suspecting public. The original cast are brought back together when a now married Weisz and Fraser, with annoying super-brain brat in tow, make off with an ancient bracelet following some hearty sacrilege and tomb robbing. Unfortunately for them, the artefact just so happens to be an essential part of an unlikely and convoluted plot to bring the original vanquished mummy from the first film back to life, as the head of a vast army of dog-headed dust monsters. Only our loveable nuclear family, again aided by comical coward John Hannah, and the mysterious desert man from the first instalment, can save the world from its sandy fate.
Of course the implausible plot serves merely as a vehicle to give the audience what they have really paid their hard earned cash for - ridiculously over-the-top action set pieces, spiced up with eye-candy special effects. Cue 2 hours of running around, fist fights, spear fights, bitch fights and the obligatory slaughter of strangely robed disposable henchmen, nasty pigmy mummy’s , super-hard spiky mummy’s, and er, eventually the mummy himself. The body count only appears to slow when writer-director Sommers injects the odd scene of twee sentimentality or cod mysticism, but do not fear as once eyes are dried and backs slapped, its shotguns out, pistols’ cocked, and back to the unrelenting action and daring-do.
VERDICT - People of 15 or more years of age can’t have been expecting too much from this blatant rehash of the first feature, however Sommers still manages to produce a film that disappoints on every level. Psychos may approve of the ridiculously high body count, but the continuous and mindless dispatching of freaky foes does not a great 2 hours viewing make. The dialogue is terrible, with dud cliché after dud cliché, and whilst some of the thousands of expensive special effects do impress, they serve ultimately to
give the film the feel of a rather predictable video game. Memorable, if only for the sight of watching Donna Air fail to convince as a dumb blonde bimbo.
2/5