More Films...
|
|
R
for strong disturbing violent content, gore, language and brief drug use.
Starring
Jack Reynor, Laia Costa, May Calamawy, Natalie Grace (II), Shylo Molina
Director
Lee Cronin
Producer
Lee Cronin, James Wan, Jason B
Genres
Thriller
Horror
Released by
Warner Bros. on
4/17/2026
Nationwide
|
Trailer
Review
Perhaps the kindest thing to say about Lee Cronin's The Mummy is that it's not the worst movie to bear the words "The Mummy" in the title. That (dis)honor belongs to the 2017 Tom Cruise disaster. Cronin's film falls well outside the purview of previous iterations, offering only a minimal nod to Egyptology and no mention whatsoever of Imhotep or Ahmanet. Instead, it opts for a "girl possessed by a demon" route but takes an inordinate amount of time to get there. It's far closer to a second-rate Exorcist remake (minus Max von Sydow) than Brendan Fraser's a-good-time-was-had-by-all outing.
One of the oddities about this The Mummy is that, despite its 133-minute running time, it struggles to tell its story. Numerous plot hiccups suggest whole scenes were inelegantly removed or poorly rearranged in the cutting room. The pacing is inconsistent; one bizarre sequence intercuts high-tension supernatural activity with exposition. The movie doesn't flow, which repeatedly breaks the immersion. Another problem - hardly unique to the horror genre but particularly glaring here - is the mind-numbingly stupid choices made by the characters. For instance, how could the family of a severely traumatized girl allow her to "recuperate" at home without medical supervision or concern for the ramifications of her violent outbursts? The movie frequently contorts logic to suit narrative necessity, and the ending feels unearned.
The story begins with a prologue in which a couple leaves their children upstairs in a farmhouse to check on a sarcophagus hidden beneath a small pyramid in the basement. Turns out - surprise, surprise - that the embalmed body has awakened. Cut to a second prologue introducing the Cannon family, an American clan temporarily relocated from Albuquerque to Egypt, who serve as the heart of the main story. When Katie, the oldest child of Charlie (Jack Reynor) and Larissa (Laia Costa), goes missing during a sandstorm, the parents are forced to endure the agony of loss compounded by the unhelpfulness of the local authorities.
We reconnect with the Cannons eight years later. Katie's disappearance is a wound that has never healed, even as Charlie and Larissa have moved on with their two younger children, Sebastian (Shylo Molina) and Maud (Billie Roy). For Detective Dalia Zaki (May Calamawy), solving the cold case has become an obsession. Then comes the break: Katie is discovered alive in the wreckage of a plane crash. Horribly disfigured and catatonic, she is brought home to recover. However, it soon becomes apparent that Katie's condition involves more than the trauma of a kidnapping. Something sinister and supernatural has happened; she is quite literally no longer herself.
Stripped down to its fundamentals, Lee Cronin's The Mummy has a solid, if generic, horror structure. With a bit more flair, it could have been a workmanlike genre entry. Unfortunately, Cronin appears to have epic pretensions that result in a sluggish and uneven production. Most of the screenplay's missteps could have been eliminated with another polish or two. There was no need for the characters to be quite so irritatingly dim-witted; while a horror staple, the lack of logic here is jarringly in-your-face. Eventually, it becomes clear the movie won't offer anything new beyond a "grimdark" aesthetic - a conviction it ultimately loses.
The acting is adequate for the material, though both leads seem to be channeling other actors, with Jack Reynor and Laia Costa recalling younger versions of Seth Rogen and Sally Hawkins, respectively. As Katie, Natalie Grace spends much of her screen time buried under unconvincing makeup. As the improbably named Carmen Santiago, Verónica Falcón seems unaware that the film isn't intended to be a parody. The standout is May Calamawy; her Detective Dalia Zaki deserves her own weekly TV procedural. How about CSI: Egypt?
The decision to put Cronin's name in the title feels more than a little egocentric. Wes Craven? Fine. John Carpenter? Deserved. But Lee Cronin? A director whose only mainstream film of note is Evil Dead Rise (which earned a modest $67M)? This was likely the studio's call, but if Warner Bros. wanted to reuse a title, they might have considered something more unique, like What Are Little Girls Made Of?
The obligatory concluding remark for a horror movie about the undead applies here: the best approach is to leave it buried. At least wait until it hits streaming, where standards naturally plummet, then see what Brendan Fraser can do with a return to his Mummy franchise next year. Fortunately, it seems unlikely that Cronin's contribution will warrant a follow-up.
© 2026 James Berardinelli
|
|
Zip: Miles:
on
AMC Kips Bay 15 1:15, 4:30, 7:45, 11:00 Metro Private Cinema 6:00, 6:30, 7:00, 7:30, 8:00, 8:30 AMC Village 7 12:30, 3:45, 7:00, 10:15 AMC 34th Street 14 11:45 AM, 3:00, 6:15, 9:25 AMC Empire 25 10:00 AM, 1:15, 4:30, 7:45, 11:00 AMC Newport Centre 11 12:40, 3:50, 7:00, 10:10 AMC 84th Street 6 12:45, 4:00, 7:15, 10:00 AMC Orpheum 7 12:30, 3:45, 10:15 AMC Orpheum 7 7:00 AMC Magic Johnson Harlem 9 12:45, 4:00, 7:15, 10:30 AMC Ridgefield Park 12 3:00, 6:10, 9:30 AMC Jersey Gardens 20 12:30, 3:45, 7:00, 10:15 AMC Bay Plaza Cinema 13 12:30, 3:45, 7:00, 10:15 Showtimes in parentheses have bargain pricing.
|
Cinemas About Town
|