Mummy Returns Review (1 Viewer)

[Kevin. W]

I am just sitting down to Mummy Returns. Will return in 2hrs to give a review.
Kevin
Review:
Easiest way too put it is if you liked The Mummy, then you'll like Mummy Returns. Picture and sound are excellent. Though a DTS version would have been nice. Plenty of supplements(have yet to watch), though I am sure Universal will have more to add in their Spectacular Special time to take $30CDN out of you pocket again Edition. When the movie comes out next Tuesday, its worth the money.
Kevin
[Edited last by Kevin. W on September 27, 2001 at 09:28 PM]

 

[Brad_W]

My wife is the manager at Hollywood Video, so we rent movies for free and usually get to see them a week before they come out (this movie being one of them, thank god they're free)... we've tried very hard to like these movies, but in the end, still hate them.
I always make fun of the mummy by roaring because that's basically what he does throughout the first one.
The Mummy Returns was worse than the first because
[spoilers alert?!!?]
1. Brendan "I can't act my way out of a wet paper bag" Fraiser and his wife constantly kiss in the movie, so much so that their child is taken from them because they are too busy ignoring him. That got old very fast.
2. when watching the dvd, there is this lame "the rock" intro for another movie of his, then the FBI warning or something akin to that, and then the movie starts showing the rock again. We were scanning past the "the rock" stuff and we accidentally skipped the first 5 minutes of the movie (when BF came along, we realized the movie had started). Is it me, or was there no title? Just too much "the rock" stuff to stomach.
3. The whole air balloon thing was lame because it reminded us (wife and I) of Waterworld. That's bad.
4 Between the bad acting, predictable everything, Indianna rip-off, and over-use of CGI... it was hard to remember this movie was even rented for free.
My two positives are:
1. The HOT women wearing slinky stuff in the Egyptian scenes were... well, hot.
2. Regarless of my usual nit-picking of films, especially this one, it was a fun first-time-rent-for-free watch.
I know you weren't really asking for oppinions, but I enjoy giving them, especially on movies.
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"I was born to murder the world." -Nix (Lord of Illusions)
My Home Page http://www.geocities.com/masternix/DVD.html
[Edited last by Brad_W on October 01, 2001 at 06:11 PM]

 

[SteveGon]

Brad, I was going to rent The Mummy Returns from my local Hollywood Video. They have a .99 rental special going on and I figured TMR was worth a buck (I haven't seen it yet). Well, turns out that the idiot manager only ordered fullscreen copies - fifty of them! Sorry, no fullscreen for me, not even for a buck!

Sounds like I'm not missing much anyway...
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He thought on homeland, the big timber, the air thin and chill all the year long. Tulip poplars so big through the trunk they put you in mind of locomotives set on end. He thought of getting home and building him a cabin on Cold Mountain so high that not a soul but the nighthawks passing across the clouds in autumn could hear his sad cry. Of living a life so quiet he would not need ears. And if Ada would go with him, there might be the hope, so far off in the distance he did not even really see it, that in time his despair might be honed off to a point so fine and thin that it would be nearly the same as vanishing.
-- Charles Frazier, Cold Mountain
[Edited last by SteveGon on October 02, 2001 at 02:47 PM]

 

[Jason Seaver]

Easiest way too put it is if you liked The Mummy, then you'll like Mummy Returns.

Or not. But this has been covered in spectacular detail.

 

[Brad_W]

Well, turns out that the idiot manager only ordered fullscreen copies - fifty of them! Sorry, no fullscreen for me, not even for a buck!
__________________________________________________ ______
Hey now, don't say idiot manager. My wife is a manager at the Hollywood Video here and she/they don't order them personally... The movies get sent to them via "the corporate." When we watched it, it was full-screen as well. When she looked through the shipping box at her store the next day, they were all Full-screen. She was lamed out because she hates full-screen (a little obsession of ours). God, I love my wife.

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"I was born to murder the world." -Nix (Lord of Illusions)
My Home Page http://www.geocities.com/masternix/DVD.html

 

[Ernesto Santos]

I walked out in disgust today from my local Horrorwood Video. Not a single widescreen version of The Mummy Returns. The funny thing is that there were millions of copies on the shelves (I guess the droves of Joe Six Packs didn't show up as they anticipated). It's just as well, I didn't particularly like the first movie of the series anyway, and believe me, there will be a series.
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[SteveGon]

Sorry Brad! I wasn't trying to imply that your wife was an idiot - in fact, she sounds pretty cool! It's a valid assumption however, to assume that a video store manager does the ordering. I didn't know that videos are automatically sent. Doesn't a manager have ANY say in the matter?
Sorry to get off-topic!
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He thought on homeland, the big timber, the air thin and chill all the year long. Tulip poplars so big through the trunk they put you in mind of locomotives set on end. He thought of getting home and building him a cabin on Cold Mountain so high that not a soul but the nighthawks passing across the clouds in autumn could hear his sad cry. Of living a life so quiet he would not need ears. And if Ada would go with him, there might be the hope, so far off in the distance he did not even really see it, that in time his despair might be honed off to a point so fine and thin that it would be nearly the same as vanishing.
-- Charles Frazier, Cold Mountain

 

[Brad_W]

Steve,
That's okay. I know this is probably the usual assumption, but as far as the Hollywood Video chain is concerned, no they don't have a say in how many or what movies to order for renting. The only say they have as far as video rental ordering is concerned is this: if they have a movie that is damaged and needs to be replaced, they order it. Other than that, the company sends them what movies, how many, what candy, what sales promotions, what to rent, what to sell, etc. They can't even put a movie out for sale previously viewed without a list sent to them from the company saying which ones can and can't.
My final thought:
Be nice to your video store employees, they deal with idiots ALL day long. My three years as a video store shift manager can attest to that. You get people calling all day asking what came out, who's in it, what's it about, what's it rated. People come in and say, "I don't owe any money, I never rented that." People asking stupid questions like where would Star Wars be located, is What Lies Beneath in the Ws or the Bs. Stupid questions all day long. This experience has lead me to believe that 99% of the Earth's population are complete idiots. If you say I'm a cynic, try working in a video store for some time... you'll agree.
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"I was born to murder the world." -Nix (Lord of Illusions)
My Home Page http://www.geocities.com/masternix/DVD.html
[Edited last by Brad_W on October 03, 2001 at 10:57 AM]

 

[Iain Lambert]

I've heard a pretty big share of 'dumb customer' stories from my brother as well (he worked in a video store for a while). But its got to be worth politely asking the staff about the lack of widescreen Mummy Returns; if the brass don't get reports of people requesting them then they won't send them out.
Oh, and I've been stuck with Blockbuster employees demanding money on false pretenses enough times to not assume that one was a dumb customer. Your wife may have trained her staff to ensure that every single rental goes on the correct card, but BB often take a proof of ID rather than the card itself, and you can end up with someone else who shares your surname's late fees. One BB even tried to hit me for a late fee on a film I bought rather than rented!

 

[AaronNWilson]

You can say its dumb customers, but I rented this FULLSCREEN movie from Hollywood video yesterday and the manager didn't even have a clue that the movie wasn't widescreen. Now that's what I call dumb.
Aaron

 

[Dean DeMass]

To bring this thread back on-topic.
I was one of the many people who slammed this film when it came out. I loved the 1st one and had decent expectations for The Mummy Returns and I was let down. After reading Ron's review a few weeks ago, I decided to give it a second chance in a controlled environment, my home theater (no snot nosed teenage punks in my theater). I actually ended up enjoying it a lot more this time around. The movie worked for me in a fun, silly type of way. However, I still wish they would have fixed that big blunder of a CGI effect at the end. The battle was very fun, but man, did Spoiler:The Scorpion King look bad. I still say they should of just had Spoiler:the Rock come out as himself and be just a total badass instead of a bad CG effect.
About the soundtrack, I see no need for a DTS track. The DD 5.1 track was reference material. I also think I am one of the few people who actually thought the footage from The Scorpion King wasn't half bad. It actually looks kind of fun in a Conan type of way.
-Dean-
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My HT Equipment
"I've seen you and you are not cool."