Bram Stoker’s The Mummy (1997) directed by Jeffrey Obrow
Speaking of Bram Stoker, here’s another film based on one of his books, in this case The Jewel of Seven Stars. Unlike Dracula, no one gives a rat’s ass whether or not this book is faithfully adapted or that it’s even been adapted at all. I mean, how many people came out of Francis Ford Coppola’s Bram Stoker’s Bingo Dingleberry’s Dracula and said, “You know, I hope someone adapts another Bram Stoker book four years from now because I am SO there!”
And you know you’re in for a treat when the packaging has to include a disclaimer such as, “Not affiliated with Universal Pictures.” Really? Did the folks at Universal really sit there and think that someone would be so mentally deficient that they would mistake this movie for the one with Brendan Fraser? How gorram insecure are the folks at Universal? If I’m going to read a warning label for a film I want it to be something like, THIS MOVIE MAY CAUSE INTENSE DIARRHEA AND KIDNEY DAMAGE. Now that’s an impressive disclaimer. Not affiliated with Universal Pictures? Why not sue people until that actually has to be the title of the movie instead of Bram Stoker’s The Mummy?
So, does anyone care if this film even vaguely follows the novel? It does…vaguely. But you don’t really care, do you? Do you?
Our story begins in 1947 in Egypt in The Valley of the Sorcerer (the lamest fake place name in fake Egyptology history) where some people are blackened to a crisp when they touch this mysterious jewel that looks like a hardened chunk of strawberry-banana jell-o.
Then we jump over to the “present day” in Marin County, California to an Egyptian themed study in a faux English manor house where Abel Trelawny is working on reading some hieroglyphs and then something bad happens to him offscreen.
The transportation of the manor house from England to California leads to the high humor value of seeing some of the worst faux British accents ever captured on the screen. I call them “faux British” because I have a theory about this: When Abel Trelawny moved out to California he couldn’t find many actual British people to work at his manor so he forced his people to speak in whatever British accents they could come up with.
That’s the only reason I can think of for saddling actors with doing accents and saddling an audience with having to sit through them. I don’t know why Abel Trelawny would attempt to recreate an English manor on the West Coast and it’s the sort of mind-boggling conundrum that makes for the better part of entertainment from this kind of film.
Meanwhile we meet our young hero Robert Wyatt (Eric Lutes of Caroline in the City) and his sidekick Brice Renard (Richard Karn, from Home Improvement). I have to say that of all the casting coups in this film this pairing is the best. Eric Lutes is just smarmy enough to sell the idea that he’s pretending to be an expert in Egyptian art and archaeology in order to impress a girl and Richard Karn alone is the highlight of the film. (I got an especial kick out of the pointlessness of the scene where Lutes calls up Karn in the middle of the night forcing Karn to talk about the faux Egyptian god Anuba while his topless companion decides to get up and leave thus earning an R rating in a completely dispensable way.) The relationship between Karn and Lutes is the most interesting one in the whole film. I mean this in the best way, but these two should get together and make more crappy movies together.
I should also take the time to mention that this crappy movie also features the talents of Louis Gossett Jr. That’s right, Academy Award Winning Actor Louis Gossett Jr. graces this crappy mummy movie with his intense presence as Corbeck the man obsessed with bringing Queen Tera back to life. (Apparently Queen Tera had seven fingers on one hand.)
Queen Tera? Why not bring back Queen Shannon and Queen Tiffany also?
Victoria Tennant makes a cameo appearance as Corbeck’s blind girlfriend. Why is she blind? Just so she can smell Corbeck’s presence on a business card. Why does Corbeck check himself into what looks like a jail cell at an insane asylum that he can leave anytime he wants? I have no clue.
I have a special enjoyment of the scene in the Trelawny study where the head of security sets us up for a drawing room mystery with all the suspects in the room. That’s where we meet the housekeeper Mrs. Grant (the omnipresent character actress Mary Jo Catlett) and her assistant Lily (Laura Otis) who remind me of how much fun it is to watch a community theatre production of an Agatha Christie play. Catlett is so over the top that I expected her to break into song at any moment. Laura Otis has a British accent so atrocious that it’s actually the basis for my earlier theory. On the other hand, we do get a decent gander at her gams which explains why anyone would hire her to speak with a bad British accent either in real life or for a mummy movie. And she has the most unexpectedly funny line in the whole film. When she goes down into the basement to get a heater she sees a bunch of sand on the ground and inexplicably escapes death at the hands of the awakened mummy (who is presumably too lazy to kill her): “Sand? I’m not cleaning that mess up.” I have never heard a more useless line from a maid in a movie.
I only wish it was a motif that she repeated throughout: “Blood? I’m not cleaning that mess up.” “Global economic collapse? I’m not cleaning that mess up.”
My first thought on seeing Amy Locane’s performance as Margaret Trelawny was that she looked wooden and glazed, but given the fact that it turns out that she is either being possessed by Queen Tera or is actually a reincarnation of Queen Tera herself or something like that it actually seems in retrospect to be foreshadowing of the twist instead of just bad acting. Frankly it was hard for me to believe that even a Melrose Place alum could act that way unless she was told to.
As with all mummy movies, the flashback sequences to Ancient Egypt leave you wanting more. I don’t care if some screenwriting workshop clown says that flashback digressions are irrelevant to the story—they’re audience gold and I want to see more of them.
On the other hand, what’s the point of including an occasional gruesome death scene only to reveal that it was a bad dream?
I’m sure that you’re all ready to run out and try to get a copy of this movie, so let me spare you the trouble by giving away the twist. Corbeck is killed by Queen Tera when he gets too uppity for her but Wyatt manages to stop Queen Tera. Everyone who doesn’t die lives happily ever after and you’d think the movie was over but you know things are going to take a turn when there’s an actual romantic honeymoon scene and when Wyatt gets up to have a bit of champagne he reveals a seven fingered deep bloody scratch on his back. Then Margaret says that Paris is the second most romantic place after Cairo. Oooh, creepy. But why would an ancient Egyptian queen think anything about Cairo, which wasn’t even founded until the 7th century A.D.?
So, what are the important lessons here?
1. Don’t bring back a mummy from the dead—and if you do don’t get all superior with them about it.
2. If you think your new partner may be a reincarnation of an ancient Egyptian queen it’s best to have a safe word. My safe word is “apples.”
3. Don’t take advice from someone who is willingly living in a jail cell with no lock.
4. Blind people can smell your business cards to know if they actually belong to you.
5. Ancient Egyptian priests could have saved themselves and the rest of us a heap of trouble by burning any seven fingered Queens as witches.
6. If you have enough money you can staff your house with people who will pretend to be British, but you’d better have enough money to train them if you don’t want them to sound ridiculous.
7. If you hire a maid because she’s pretty, you can be sure she won’t clean up any sand that spills in your basement.
All in all, you’d have to be a real fan of mummy movies to give this one a try, or a hardcore Bram Stoker follower. While the cast of known actors gives this film a leg up if you’re looking to do a game of “where have I seen you before?” you’d be better off popping in the previously mentioned Lorenzo Lamas oddity if you need to see a moderately bad film.
