Hello everyone!
Today I'm writing about an oldie (but a goldie), since the movie is now seven years old already (time flies!), but it was screened on TV this weekend and we made a sort of family night out of it, so I thought to myself, why not? So we watched The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, although my original thought (come into reality the first time I watched it, seven years ago) remains the same, which is that it really fell woefully short of the first two movies (The Mummy, and The Mummy Returns). Now, THOSE two were definitely worth their salt, and I always laugh when I watch them - even if I watch them now, a millionth time later. That's saying something about comedic relief, right? But then, Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz had it all down pat as far as I'm concerned, and while the third movie brought in some old anecdotes and connected to the previous ones, it still just ... wasn't quite there.
The plot, really, isn't all that difficult to figure out: the O'Connell's have tried settling down after World War II and end up being bored out of their skulls (or in this case, Rick is so bored he shoots fish for a hobby, go figure). They get offered a chance to transport this huge diamond, the Eye of Shangri-la, to China. Meanwhile, on the other side of the world, their son Alex has unearthed the Emperor - and gotten beat-up by a girl. Needless to say, the Eye (with water from the mystical fountain of life, or youth, whichever comes to mind first) gives life to this Emperor, and the race is on to send him back to hell before he can take over the world. Sounds familiar? You'll just have to stop by Jonathan's 'Imhotep' bar, a nice nod to the original bad guy, and ask around. The team rag-tag thei way up into the Himalayas, where Rick gets stabbed nearly to death, the Emperor bathes in the fountain and raises his terracota army, and the witch who originally cursed him, Zi Yuan, releases the soldiers and subjects hehad built under a wall of his after he killed them. Oh also, she has a daughter, and said daughter kicked Alex O'Connell's butt. She gets kidnapped, they head down into China again to rescue her, Rick gets manhandled by the 'mummy' - and he and Alex send him back to hell.
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Really, the plot in itself wasn't anything too exciting or amazing, but it was a proven recipe I suppose, with the additional twist that clashes with what we see in the second movie when it comes to the relationships between family members, in that Alex is now a sort of renegade and feels estranged from his parents, who spend the rest of the movie making it up to him.
I can honestly say that the movie itself is entertaining, but not on par with the first two, maybe also because of the change in the main actress, or maybe just because this humour sort of didn't stick as much as the other did.
There were gems, however. Killing the same mummy - twice. No call for bad language. Spank my ass! Or the last bit - when poor Jonathan leaves China to a place 'with no mummies' ... and soon afterwards mummies are discovered in Peru.
You have to feel for the poor guy.
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There are talks of rebooting the whole franchise, if I've read the articles online right, although by the sound of it (modern day, mummies in Iraq), I'm not TOO keen on the whole thing. I'll still take a peek though, if it happens, although I'll probably always just feel like one and two were the best.
Have any of you seen the Mummy movies? Which one was your favourite?
xx
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