October 15 - The Mummy

Not many people are aware of Hammer Studios' contribution to the horror genre, but back in the late 50's, they managed to get the rights from Universal studios in Hollywood to remake the classic monster movies, such as Frankenstein, Dracula and the Mummy. The first horror movie they made was the Mummy, and finally, instead of reviewing one of the many remakes, I get to review the original! :-D

John (Peter Cushing) is on an archaeological dig with his father and uncle in 1895 when he injures his leg, stopping him from entering the tomb of Ananka, an egyptian princess who died millennia ago. His uncle and father do enter, however, and the father discovers the Scroll of Life, and reads the words upon the scroll. The uncle rushes back into the tomb to see what happened to John's father, and finds the father in a state of shock that lasts 3 years. After finishing at the tomb, John seals it and returns to england to put the mummified corpse of the princess in a london museum. 1898 comes, and after struggling to free the Mummy (Christopher Lee) an egyptian priest brings it to england and unleashes it upon those who desecrated the tomb of the princess! :-o

This apparently marks the first time the 2 main parts of Hammer film studios 2 decades of horror came together. Peter Cushing, who usually played the "van helsing" sort, and Christopher Lee, who usually played the monster. This film also marks the first time in human history that a single actor (Christopher Lee) played all three major classic film monsters, Dracula, Frankenstein, and the Mummy. Hammer film studios made so many sequels to the first few movies that it took them well into the early 70's before they started winding down, in addition to making a score of other horror films based on various other legends, myths and magicks. I guess after 20 years of horror films, anyone could use a change of pace. Then again, I been watching them for 40 years and I have yet to get tired of them, so, what do I know?

The first to die in this film is John's father, who is recovering in an insane asylum when the Mummy breaks in and chokes him to death. The next to die is John's Uncle, who is killed right in front of John, leaving John the only remaining violator of Ananka's tomb. John fires several bullets into the Mummy, but the mummy shrugs them off as if they were mosquito bites. Can John discover the secret to stopping the unstoppable mummified undead creature before it kills him? :-o

I just realized, all the classic monsters are forms of undead. Dracula, Frankenstein and the Mummy, all undead. Interesting, isn't it? Humankind's most feared common memories are all reanimated dead things. The only classic horror film monster that isn't already dead is the Werewolf, who is representative of the loss of control, the loss of reason, the sheer animal madness that can affect us all from time to time. So is that all of man's fears in a nutshell? The fear of death, and the fear of the loss of reasoning? Or is that just one fear, with two mirrored aspects, the loss of consciousness, the loss of the self, whether brought on by death, that final long sleep, or by madness, that irrevocable loss of control, loss of the feeling of self, from which it is near impossible to return?

Makes sense to me. You didn't expect a movie review to give you the secret source of all your fears, did you? ;-)