The Mummy - Tomb of the Dragon Emperor
(Reviewed on 08/06/2008)
The "Loves His Mummy" ROSSMAN
Back in 2001 I caught a lot of flak from the world at large (well, two reader letters mocking me at least) for my positive review of The Mummy Returns. I said it was a fun (but pretty mindless and unnecessary) summer movie, and I hold by those words. I still pop both the original movie (The Mummy) and its sequel in the old DVD player every so often. After both made shitloads of money though, I was quite surprised that they didn't seem interested at all in making a third. Yeah, they killed the shit out of Imhotep (twice) and the Scorpion King in both original flicks, but they could have done a number of things to bring either big bad back for yet another Rick and Evie adventure against the armies of the undead.
Years later, it was announced that yes, we would be getting another Mummy movie, and yes, Brendan Fraser would also return, along with the fop who played Evie's pussy brother Jonathan... But Rachel Weisz would not be returning, and neither would that male gigolo from Deuce Bigalow who helped the good guys battle the undead Egyptian assholes twice before... Bad news there, but what really kicked me in my Mummy-fanboy nads was the fact that writer/director Stephen Sommers wouldn't even be back. Say what you will about Sommers (that he's a hack, makes his action movies too confusing and convoluted, and that he plays up the dopey humor too much), but he really gets excited about his own flicks and makes them fun... I'm talking about the first two Mummy movies here — I won't even touch Van Helsing with a ten foot pole in this review. Without him leading his own characters I was very, extremely, diarrhea-shittingingly weary. I became even more anal-squirtingly anxious when I heard that Rob Cohen (of Stealth and The Fast and the Furious fame) would be the man behind the next Mummy camera.
I did start to feel a little bit better about things when I first read that we'd be leaving Egypt and heading to post WWII China for the 3rd Mummy plot, and that Jet Li (Jet fucking LI!) and Michelle Yeoh would both be in it, but then I remembered that most of Jet's American movies were shit, and that Cohen couldn't film a decent action scene if his nuts were placed on an open bear-trap, threatening to clamp closed if he screwed it up.
It is with that trepidation that I went to see The Mummy - Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, and I'm here to tell you now that this movie never happened. Ignore all those ads on TV and on the web pushing what you think is a new movie... That movie never really happened. No, Rick and Evie's son Alex (the kind of cool kid from The Mummy Returns who was as brave, spunky, and unannoying as you hoped Anakin would have been in the Star Wars prequels) didn't turn into the world's biggest douchebag in this third flick in the series, Jet Li and Ms. Yeoh weren't squandered and portrayed as shitty CGI terra cotta effects for more than half the movie, and most especially, giant fluffy YETI were not godawful plot contrivances that were tossed into the mix and then conveniently forgotten about before we jump into the third and final shit-tacular act. No, the entire point of "what the fuck does it take to make a person immortal?!" isn't fucked with, made up, ignored, then made up in a different way, and then forgotten five times before then end of this waste of $150million production. Nope. And you just imagined that whole "the terra cotta army of the damned emperor has to cross the Great Wall of China in order to become truly invincible" last minute plot appendage that they tacked on to the final 15 minutes in an attempt to actually give Rick and Evie something to try and stop Jet Li's army from doing. None of this stuff happened, because this movie doesn't exist. Keep repeating that to yourself and you will be a very happy person. The Mummy III never happened. Go watch Batman 2 again.
Holy fuck! As much as I'll admit the first two Mummy movies were a mess plotwise, this one makes them look like Citizen Kane and Mel Gibson's Hamlet (the only Shakespearean movie I can remember at the moment) respectively. Things start off with Rick and Evie in retirement from.... What? It's stated matter of factly that they were spies for Britain during WWII, but where the fuck did that come from? She was an Egyptologist and he was a reincarnated ancient Egyptian American who sticks out like a sore thumb wherever he goes. Whatever. Anyway, the British government then comes to them both and asks them to undertake one last mission: Return a GIANT FUCKING DIAMOND to China. Sure, whatever. Great. But of course this diamond is magic, and it's very necessary to revive the evil sonovabitch first emperor of China who's been cursed into a clay statue by a good Chinese witch several thousand years earlier. Oh, and (because the writers are hacks) the diamond leads the way to Shangri-la as well... They could have said it was a map to Cobra-La and I wouldn't have been less impressed, but once again, whatever. And itjustsohappens that Rick and Evie's boy, the grown up and now douchey Alex, is in China himself and he just —who'da thunk it — discovered this long-hidden emperor's final resting place. At that exact moment. Then 50 more incredible (and far from explainable) co-inky-dinks occur in rapid succession (Jonathan's in China too, as is the inexplicable, but needed-for-the-plot, old friend of Rick's who just so goddamn happens to have a plane that he'll need for one small point in his new mission to kill the immortal Dragon Emperor who was accidentally awoken by the giant diamond that ANOTHER old family friend happened to help break on Empy's hidden form and then the gay yeti showed up and nobody ever got shot despite the fact that more ammo was used up in this movie than in the first three Rambo movies combined and then we find out that the "immortal Dragon Emperor" is really far from immortal but he can turn into any form he can think of which means that he really doesn't need his easily breakable pottery army but that would have made the movie really short if he won by the end of the second act, and right now I just hate this movie so, so, sooooo much for its shitty dialogue, unexciting "action scenes," and pathetic bad AND good guys that I'm just going to scream....
There. The neighbors hate me now, but I feel better. This was such an epic piece of shit... And I have never been more proud of an audience that I watched a flick with in a packed theater before. Every single lame attempt at a joke was completely ignored by my fellow movie-goers. Somebody even gave a lone *cough* at a long comedy beat that director Cohen made damn sure was in the movie in order to give the intended audience time to stop laughing so that they wouldn't miss any "important dialogue." My audience didn't cheer at any of the intended "Yeah! The heroes kick ASS! Whoo hoo!" moments, and somebody actually rolled their eyes and proclaimed "what a goddamn DOUCHEBAG" at Alex whenever he acted like a complete tool to either his parents or the chick he told himself he was going to bone (without telling her first)... Okay, the person yelling out "DOUCEBAG!" every 30 seconds was me, but my point is still made. My point is: This movie sucked so bad it never happened. Please, people, let us ignore this flick into oblivion. Not only to make them stop giving Cohen work, but so that this shitfest won't even sell one DVD or Blu-Ray disc. It must DIE.
CARL and the
Monkey of Madness
Review the Mummy 3? What Mummy 3 movie starring Jet Li? Never happened.
Emperor KUNI
Holy fuckin' SHIT! Greatest Jet Li mummy movie EVER! Holy shit! So many dead people killed by Jet Li, and Michelle Yeoh kick so many Chinese Nazi people's ass! Yes! And the hairy snowmen who fight for the good Chinese people are the bestest thing to ever happen to Chinese mummy movies since Jackie Chan killed that baby for that movie with the baby that died! I would kill 10 babies to see Jet Li turn into Ghidorah again! Ghidorah Jet Li could eat FIVE hairy snowmen and still kill stupid American Brendan Fraser! This is greatest mummy ever!
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