Speaker #0Hello everyone and welcome to the concession stand here on the KB radio network. I am your host Kevin Reed and welcome to the review of the new supernatural horror film Lee Cronin's The Mummy written and directed by wait for it Lee Cronin. This film stars Jack Rayner, Layla Costa and May Calloway. In this film the young daughter of a journalist disappears into the desert without a trace eight years later the broken family is shocked when she returns to them as this should be a joyful reunion yet it turns into a living nightmare uh lee cronin uh i'm a big fan of evil dead rise which came out two, three years ago and he directed that film because I'm a Evil Dead, I'm a Deadite. I love Evil Dead. And I think what he did with Evil Dead Rise was like, chef's kiss, keeping the spirit of the original films alive in that film, yet giving it his own spin and putting his own style and flavor in it. I loved Evil Dead Rise. Going into this movie, I was a little nervous because it's the mummy and look this isn't to be confused with the brandon frazier films from the 90s the more indiana jones take on the mummy and it definitely definitely wasn't the tom cruise mummy from i think about 10 15 years ago the action adaptation of the mummy and that that movie was horrible. Straight up trash. It's sold out. I was a little nervous going into this, but not nervous in a sense like, I think he's going to mess up the lore because there's no real lore to the mummy. I mean, you can do whatever you want with the mummy. And as long as you keep the, I guess, core of the mummy intact, which is pretty basic, you unearth an evil being that has been dormant for... hundreds if not thousands of years yeah that's pretty much that's pretty much the basics of every mummy movie going all the way back to the 1930s so as long as you keep that intact you you're pretty you're pretty good yet it did pique my curiosity to see lee cronin's version of the mummy you know with his style because he doesn't hold back he you're getting full bore gore when it comes to lee cronin and i love him for it you know if you're gonna go in what's the saying go big or go home he goes big he goes big he's not going to sugarcoat any gore or any disgusting images or blood or whatever the case may be now with all that being said did i enjoy lee cronin's the mummy yes i i i really did enjoy it It's... it's a true horror film something we don't get these days you know you get the standard teen slasher horror movies with no substance that's what we've grown accustomed to nowadays it's a breath of fresh air to finally get a horror film that actually told a story now did it execute the story perfectly no it didn't it there's some there are some problems that would with uh the mummy here but i think one of the things going into this if you haven't seen the film yet take the mummy out of it don't go in thinking it's a mummy movie it's not a traditional mummy movie that's not that's not what you're signing up for here this is more i would if i had to compare it to anything or blend it with certain films to kind of give you an apt description of it. It's more Evil Dead meets Exorcist with a sprinkle, just a little sprinkle of the mummy in it. That's basically what this is. This is more of a possession film than it is a mummy film. And, you know, that's fine. It didn't have to be mummies. It's not like I'm running out to see a mummy movie because there's a mummy in it. No, it's not like a vampire film or a werewolf film. The mummy is the mummy. Probably one of the lamest of the universal monsters. You know, because it's a mummy. He's wrapped in bandages and all this other stuff. And now, in regards to this film, let me start off with the positives here. The film is shot beautifully. this movie looks awesome it is amazing looking uh kudos to lee cronin for uh uh his style of filmmaking here you know the close-ups are disturbing everything it it's like every shot was creepy and it wasn't i don't know if that was the intent or it was just me waiting for something to happen but it was just creepy you know the way the shadows move the way uh certain actors were positioned in rooms and stuff like that it was it was very very creepy and of course yes it's bloody it's gory if you're into that you will love this if you was into evil dead rise you would not have a problem with this movie but i know a lot of people aren't into body horror and that style of horror. So... If that's not your bag, you're probably not going to like this movie. But I'm going to throw it off in the visual. And I completely enjoyed it. I liked the gore because it wasn't gore for gore's sake. It was, it do seem like it was a little gory at times, but it wasn't. It actually worked within the story, believe it or not. I think it, I think it worked. The sound design, the way you hear the. bones cracking and the flesh peeling and all this other stuff yeah it's it it worked it worked on you it works on you in that field especially in the theater when you listening to it surround sound uh it is it is very disturbing um the acting here was fairly well i i think all the actors did a really good job but I'll circle back to the acting yet again when we dive into the negatives because it's it's split it's it the acting was good but there's problems but i'll get to that in a negative section but as far as uh one actor that i felt was great throughout the film and that was natalie grace who plays katie the the young daughter who went missing and returned and she's went through this mummification bruh what a performance by this young actress that she held it if she didn't work the movie would have fell apart the only way this film would have had just a smidgen of success it had to nail this casting of this young girl going through this experience and i don't know if she's been in anything else i tried to look her up she must have it I haven't seen her in anything else, me personally. But this feels like her first time at bat. And I will say, I'm not going to say she hit a home run, but it was definitely a double, maybe even a triple. She probably got on third base with it. She was really, really good throughout the film. I mean, from every scene she was in, she was great. She was the standout to me. Absolutely amazing. uh the other young actress who plays the little sister the youngest of the children i liked her performance as well i think she was great throughout the film too my other positive is the feel of a global type threat type uh situation we're not just centered on one spot or one house it with this family here uh because we go back and forth to New Mexico with the family, and to Egypt, where this incident took place, but once we leave early in the movie, we think, okay, that's it for the Egypt part of this film. No, we go back to it, and it's like a concurrent story going on between the detective that's there in Egypt still investigating the missing persons case with Katie, and the family that is dealing with this, quote unquote reunion in New Mexico so I love that feel it felt like it was bigger stakes bigger scale to this movie and it worked speaking of uh scale of the film i think this movie took some big risks some really big risks some i'm gonna go over in the negative portion of the review but uh overall i i respect the fact that they took the risk i respect the fact that they attempted to tell a family drama They're dealt with. lost dealt with grief dealt with uh trying to move on trying to push past uh uh this this missing person and uh the playing the blame game who thought it was and all of those elements that was that that that will follow a family that goes through something like this and man it was it was very bold of them to do this in the middle of a supernatural body horror. I thought that was very unique, even though it wasn't original, but it was unique. Now, let's jump into the negatives, because the more I try to hold back on it, the worse it gets. The negatives of this film. This movie, first and foremost, is two hours and 15 minutes long. Now, it's long, but it's not boring. But it didn't need to be two hours and 14 minutes. Like I said, it's not boring at no point during that two hours and 14 minutes. I was bored. I actually enjoyed everything that I was looking at. But it was two hours and 14 minutes because you can really look back. You can look back and pinpoint two, maybe even three scenes. You could have either trimmed down or took out completely in the move. The story still would have moved forward just as well. That's the stuff that I'm like, OK, you can tighten this up a little bit. It didn't have to be that long. Now, don't get me wrong. I'm not against long movies. The Exorcist was what? Three hours or close to three hours. You know, the Shining was close to three hours. those horror films you can make horror films longer than 90 minutes i'm all for that you know if it's good now this movie was good but it wasn't two hours in 15 minutes good you you could have trimmed this down uh to a tight tight tight hour 45 minutes and it would have been just as good if not better but it is what it is it is a little too long My other issue, or one of the other issues, going back to the acting, like I mentioned before, the actors were fine. They were doing exactly what was on the paper. They acted their behinds off. They showed emotion. They did everything they were supposed to do. The problem with the acting, all you got was like shock looks throughout the film. And that's more of a directing thing. than acting but when i need to hear dialogue i didn't get dialogue it wasn't this kind of links up with the length of the movie if you take away the long shot looks on faces the holding of those shots you would get an hour and 45 you you didn't have to lock in on a shock look on the face and i mean lock in for like a a good minute we're getting these look now don't get me wrong in the context context of the scene it makes sense why they would be shocked and uh uh speechless at that moment but we didn't have to linger on it so long um the this is a non-spoiler review if you can't tell but i'm gonna talk about something and this isn't this isn't uh spoiling the climax or giving away any story or nothing like that but this is just one scene in the movie that i'm going to talk about but if you don't want to hear nothing about the movie this is the part where you pause it but if you don't care here we go the there was a scene where let's just say it was a family function there was a family function going on with a gathering of loved ones Right and Something happened in that scene that involved Katie. And it made absolutely no sense to me. For the simple fact you had all these people in here. Now, up to this point, up to this point, nobody knew Katie had been found. There was no press conference. The press was left out of the discovery of Katie because it takes place eight years after she went missing. Right. So nobody knew this. It's so dead When she pops up at this family function, there was no, oh my God, is that Katie? There was no, it was none of that. It was none of that. Now, now granted, the shenanigans that was going on at the time she popped up, I would imagine nobody was paying 100% attention to it. But even after, nobody brought it up. It was, it was like, okay, that happened. but that scene even though it was an awesome scene and that's the example i was talking about earlier i'm hot and cold with it you know yeah it was a cool scene but the scene didn't make sense in the grand scheme of it all but cool also we're dealing with this supernatural force here uh once again i'm dancing around spoilers here we're dealing with a supernatural force that apparently can do much more than just possess katie and i'm wondering why just why it didn't it the logic didn't make sense and you know it just didn't make sense why she became the puppet master and of sorts like i can't get into it because i don't want to spoil it is a non-spoiler review but if you see the movie you know what i'm talking about the the the fact that she's able to do some of the things that she's doing is like well why is she why does she care about getting free you know why does this thing care about being let loose if it's you can see they would she was doing more damage when she was bound in a wheelchair here. than she did after she got the got loose it just didn't that didn't compute with me that's the that's the one thing i literally left out the theater a little mad about i was i was really upset about that but uh in another thing the last thing that i would point out negatively is the ending even though the ending is a satisfying ending it didn't quite land it was so close but it didn't quite get there but i did leave happy i did leave satisfied i i thought it was a really really good movie a really good horror movie even though i have my complaints i think it's one of the better horror movies i've seen in a while you know in the theater i really felt like it was money well spent you Lee Cronin's The Mummy gets a letter grade of a C+. Yeah, it was good. It was a good horror movie. It should have been better, but it was really, really good. Really, really good. But that's just one man's opinion. I would like to know yours. Did you watch Lee Cronin's The Mummy going in thinking you was going to see Brandon Frazier running through the desert? shooting mummies i would love to know your thoughts of the film email the show kbradiopodcast at gmail.com you can also search for the show on all social media platforms just search for the kb radio network also don't forget about youtube subscribe to the kb radio network channel and like this video if you don't mind don't forget about the five stars the reviews and sharing this show if you're listening on apple podcast spotify iheart radio wherever you are currently listening to the concession stand here on the KB Radio Network. Everybody, thank you for joining me for this review of Lee Cronin's The Mummy. I want you all to know that I love you. Continue to love everyone, and until we speak again, you all be blessed.