On The Mummy

Imhotep (Arnold Vosloo) was Pharoah's High Priest before he started messing around with Pharoah's sweetheart. After their discovery, Imhotep's lover commits suicide and Imhotep is buried alive with a terrible curse hanging over him. Three thousand years later, Evelyn Carnahan's (Rachel Weisz) ne'er-do-well brother Jonathon (John Hannah) brings her an artifact he lifted from someone's pocket. Fascinated with Egyptology, she naturally gets excited when she discovers the artifact contains a map to Hamunaptra, the mythical City of the Dead. Evie and her brother immediately go to see the man who had the artifact when Jonathon, um, borrowed it. The three, accompanied by a tag-along, set off to find the City of the Dead - and end up waking a monster.

Pros: I really like the heroine. It seems to me that action/adventure girls are usually either air-headed or practically ninjas. This one is a nice balance between toughness and femininity. I was also quite pleased to discover this movie is more action/adventure than horror. The special effects are well done for a 1999 movie, although the mummy himself was a little weak. Also, there are surprisingly few sexual references - and no sexual content or references between the hero and the heroine (that I can remember).

Cons: There were some gross-out parts. Just the mention of scarabs sends a shiver down my spine! Also, the opening scenes are dreadful - for more reasons than one. I didn't like how they brought the ten plagues of Egypt into the story. God, who is Goodness, sent those to free the Israelites - and now they're controlled by an evil monster? Plus, not all ten of the plagues are in the movie, which I thought was odd.

My Rating: MT (sexual content and references (including "partial" nudity that is closer to "complete" nudity), gross-out things)