I started writing for Moviefreak in 2001. Getting accredited with publicists and the major studios is a bit of a long and painful process, especially here in Seattle. Eventually everything worked itself out, and lo and behold I was up heading to press screenings, all of which led to my very first posted review on the site for the semi-disastrous Warren Beatty comedy Town & County. 

Brendan Fraser in Universal Pictures' The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor

Longtime readers of the site probably know some of this already. Heck, they might even know that particular review was the first one I’d ever written for Moviefreak. What they do not know is that this was not the first screening I ever had authorization from the studio to attend. That honor went to The Mummy Returns, and that Stephen Sommers directed sequel was such a monumental piece of unmitigated crap I almost couldn’t believe my eyes. Needless to say, I ended up not writing a word about it (until now), and even though it was a gigantic hit every time I even think about the picture I can’t help but want to groan and roll my eye in exasperated long-repressed agony.

It probably comes as no surprise, but the long in coming third entry in this silly series from Universal Pictures The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor is a much better film than that utterly reprehensible second chapter. In fact, I’d go so far as to say this latest sequel is easily as good as the 1999 original (itself, of course, a semi-remake of the 1932 Boris Karloff classic). Granted, seeing as how I thought that one was a complete waste of time and not worth anyone’s effort, none of what I just said here should be remotely construed as a compliment.

Taking over for Sommers (who went off to make next summer’s G.I. Joe: Rise of the Cobra instead), new director Rob Cohen (The Fast and the Furious, Stealth) does a remarkably pedestrian job with this post-WW II adventure set in the vivid landscapes of a wind-swept China. While he admirably cuts down on the CGI used to such excruciating extremes in the previous installment, there is so little in the way of anything either new or different (or even interesting, for that matter) going on here I admit to being absolutely bored out of my skull. Truth be told, I didn’t hate this new entry in the series, the fact was I was far too uninterested by it to work up the energy to even care enough to try.

The story picks up a little over a decade after the events of part two, Rick (Brendan Fraser) and Evelyn (Maria Bello, taking over for a wisely departed Rachel Weisz and doing the worst English accent this side of Kevin Costner) O’Connell heading to Shanghai on a mission for the British Government only to find their now-grown son Alex (Luke Ford) has unearthed a Mummy of his very own, a 2,000 year-old vanquished warlord known as the Dragon Emperor (Jet Li). After he is (of course) resurrected, the globe-trotting family, along with Evelyn’s bumbling brother Jonathan (John Hannah) and mysterious sorceress Zi Juan (Michelle Yeoh), finds themselves racing against time to stop this new villain before he can regain his powers and unleash the fury of his 10,000 strong Terracotta Army.

What can else other can I say except for been there, done that, and I don’t really care to be doing it again? Not much, save maybe that Alfred Gough and Miles Millar’s (Spider-Man 2) script is as rudimentary and as pointless as these things come. You get the feeling watching it no one would know an original idea if it came up and slapped them in the face, everything from the crazy fast-talking pilot to the field goal-kicking Yetis as asinine and as silly as anything else I’ve seen this year.

You’d think, even with so much going wrong, the filmmakers would have at least had the common sense to let Asian superstars Li and Yeoh work some of their rapid fire martial arts magic. But while you keep waiting to see this legendary dynamic duo in a magnetically high-flying face-off, the truth is their ultimate pairing is disappointingly anticlimactic. Not only is it over before it even has a chance to begin, Cohen films it so horribly it’s almost impossible to enjoy the visual poetry of the two actor’s spectacular movements. It is a complete and total waste, and the more I think about it the more disgusted I am.

When the dust settles I can at least thank The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor for getting me to recollect on a web career here at Moviefreak that’s lasted far longer and been much more interesting than I ever could have imagined. I go into the theater each week in hopes I’ll find another The Visitor, witness a WALL-E, be blown away by an Edge of Heaven, be awestruck by another The Dark Knight. While it didn’t happen this time, if I’ve learned one thing over the past eight it is that I know it will again, usually when I least expect it. But not this time, and if ever a franchise should have been left dead and buried this one had to be it. 

Film Rating: ê1/2 (out of 4)

Additional Links

-  The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor Theatrical Trailer 
-  The Mummy Returns Theatrical Trailer
-  The Mummy (1999) Theatrical Trailer
-  The Mummy (1932) Theatrical Trailer