Ugh.

Rating: 5/10 (5 May 2001)

Since I was a fan of the original, "The Mummy," I made the mistake of expecting the same witty (and oftentimes silly) action story. I should have known better.
I don't know who the film-makers are aiming for with this film... it certainly does not seem to be the fans of the original, but rather, their children and to those who came to see the film because they love The Rock. It was to "The Mummy" what "Phantom Menace" was to the original Star Wars trilogy, a film seemingly made to appeal to young children and to sell action figures. There was _just_ enough clever banter thrown in, as well as some really great fight sequences, to make this acceptable to older viewers, in my opinion. The introduction of yet another smart-aleck 8 year old kid does nothing for me. A child in the story is fine, but this one was just a little over the top. The kids seem to love him, though, even though I imagine that some of the same children laughing at his antics could hardly have sat through and stomached the original movie with its much more adult humor.
While some of the original characters are retained, only the personalities of the shifty brother, Jonathan, and the solemn tattooed warrior (I forget the name) are left intact. While I can see that the intention was to show that Rick O'Connell had grown in character to become more responsible as a husband and now as a father, it left him rather dry and boring as compared to the dashing Indiana Jones type which he had been. Quite a change, indeed, and it left me mourning for his previous flair. He was rather convincing as a concerned father and husband though. Evie also underwent a major change, going from a somewhat shy and awkward but entirely convincing bookish young woman with an honest appreciation and enthusiasm for Egyptian history to a scantily clad (is that tight, deep cleavage cut top and heavy black eyeliner _really_ what she wears as her excavation gear?) and completely confident woman. While confidence is nice, and shows the strength of a woman, I did not understand the depth of this change from her former sweet and appealing self... I suppose it is meant to appeal to men. I dunno. Or mayhap it was her "mysterious dreams" which instituted the change. She was not very convincing as a mother, either, it seemed. If my husband and I had been through what they had in "The Mummy," I would never leave my curious and foolish young son alone in a tomb whilst I went exploring deeper to find an ancient artifact of great power which I had been dreaming about.... I would know that bad things could arise from such a situation.
Imhotep returns in a much less frightening role, at times seeming to be just confused and lost in the story. It seems like he was just included so they could say that the mummy "returned." I would much rather have seen the O'Connells battle the Scorpion King rather than have the story muddled by a not very frightening (but handsome) Imhotep. He really didn't add much to the story, and toward the end I was actually liking him as much as I did the main characters, just because he seemed more human and somewhat bumbling. His mistress, once reincarnated, is interesting as a character and pulls off her role well.
I was hoping that even if the story was not good, the action and special effects would still make the movie worth watching. True for the fights... they really were awesome and intense. But the special effects? Sigh. Nope! If anything, they pulled it down. The backdrops were fuzzy and too pale (they actually made my eyes hurt), the creatures looked as if they had a few more computer-imaging steps to go through, and the Scorpion King was just plain fake looking. Scary, though. I think that the battle scenes betwixt the army o' Annubis and the Magi were well done, but closeups of the jackal warriors left something lacking. Very smooth and battle-droidy, if you know what I mean. The airship was just silly, silly, silly. Why an airship? Why, oh why? It looked like something off of some made-for-TV adventure movie, and just made me want to giggle.
Aside from the effects and characters, the story itself was disjointed and weak. Too many coincidences, too many subplots that amounted to very little, and horribly strained dialog and chase scenes that smacked of being forced. Take out the suddenly rather lame Imhotep, take out the whole reincarnation and "chosen one" deal, take out the whole ludicrous airship sequence, and take out most of the pygmy mummies... and perhaps that would have made it worth watching. As it was, I was ready to be done with it not even halfway through the film, and caught myself thinking about other things... my garden, whether or not to go to Wal-Mart after the movie, and so on. Not minding when you need to get up to go to the restroom is not a good sign.
I think that the return of the Scorpion King and his legions of minions with their world domination plan would have sufficed for a good story without throwing in all of the riff-raff about Imhotep and past lives. It was simply rambling and long, much like my comments here! This film really semed like it wasn't finished, that there was still some MAJOR editing left to do, and of course the CGI needed to be actually completed rather than seemingly just thrown together for a test run. And the blaring, clanging music was driving me insane with its insistence.... WATCH THE ACTION! BE EXCITED! BE SAD NOW! BE SCARED! BE HAPPY! When the music tries to drive me along like that with its volume and clamor.... argh!!! I am not a fool and can deduce at which times I am supposed to feel a certain emotion without being led along by the hand by overpowering instrumentals.
I am very disappointed, and I can honestly say that even if I HADN'T liked or even seen the first movie, I still would not have enjoyed this one.
I gave it 5 stars out of 10. Right up there with Mission to Mars!!!