Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A Very Good Book, Based On My Favorite Film, March 18, 2000
This novel, by Max Allan Collins (Saving Private Ryannovelazation), is based on the hit Universal Pictures film "TheMummy", starring Brendan Fraser - which happens to be my favorite film. After seeing the film back in May '99, right away I did a few things. Such as buying the other versions (from 1932 and 1959). Then in September I bought it on video (in widescreen of corse!) and recentaly purchesed the soundtrack, which was exellent! Beautiful, beautiful music by Jerry Goldsmith. My next chore was to go out and buy the book. I did, and sat down and read it in a few days - and I'll say, it was worth the money! It wasn't THE movie however (in my review for the movie, I gave it 5 stars), which only means that the book was a little boring in some parts, and details the action scenes too much. I'll say this though, it does entertainingly explain most of the major characters origins, providing a wonderful back story to keep in mind while watching the film. There are a few changes made in the novel, such as some details in the ancient egypt prolouge that resemble the original Karloff "Mummy", and during the desert trek to Hamunaptura, the crew stumbles upon a desert oasis - some extra diologue is injected into that; but I won't detail it all to much, so everyone can enjoy it better when they read it for the first time. Overall, it is a good adaptation of an even better movie, with some good metephores, in depth character development and a very good desciption of the "stage one" mummy. Read this book if you enjoyed the movie, you won't regrete it! END
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
"It Speaks of the Night and of the Day...", November 17, 2005
Universal Pictures' "The Mummy" was a great little film; exciting, funny, action-packed, with a dash of romance, and it got away with all this because it didn't take itself too seriously. It knew it wasn't a `thinking' movie, just a bit of fun, and it catered to its intended audience well. A novel tie-in was inevitable considering the amount of money the film made, and Max Allen Collins was given the task of adapting the screenplay to book-form.
I can't see anyone reading this novel who hasn't already watched (or is at least familiar with) the movie, so perhaps a synopsis is redundant, but here we go: in 1,290 BC the high priest Imhotep and his lover Anck-su-namun murdered the Pharaoh and were punished accordingly. Anck-su-namun committed suicide with the belief that her lover could resurrect her from the dead, but before the ritual could be completed, the body-guards of the Pharaoh - the Med-jai - interrupted and placed Imhotep under a curse. Mummifying him alive, they decreed that should he ever arise again he would be a plague upon mankind, bringing forth the ten plagues of Egypt (why anyone would place someone under a curse that potentially held so much danger to themselves is as unclear here as it was in the movie - it's best not to question it).
Thousands of years later in the 1920s, a group of treasure-hunters come together in the hopes of finding Hamanaptra, the City of the Dead, and the treasures hidden within. Evelyn Carnahan and her ne'er-do-well brother Jonathan enlist the help of legionnaire Rick O'Connell, who has been to the City before and agreed to take them back. But before they even get to the City, they run up against a gun-slinging group of Americans led by O'Connell's slimy ex-comrade Beni who are also looking for Hamanaptra, and a group of mysterious desert-folk led by one Ardeth Bay, who are intend in driving away the treasure-hunters.
It doesn't take a genius to figure out that the mummy is accidentally resurrected and begins to unleash havoc, as he tracks the necessary tools to bring back his dead-love Anck-su-namun; choosing Evy as his chosen sacrifice. From there comes the quintessential heroic quest: stop the monster, rescue the damsel in distress and save the world.
It all makes for a fun movie-watching experience, but how is it as a book? The main problem is that "The Mummy" was predominately an action-movie, and action simply doesn't translate well from the screen to the page. Watching Brendan Fraser fight a handful of mummies will always be more thrilling than *reading* about Brendan Fraser fighting them, and since most of the movie involves fighting, shooting, stabbing, running, brawling and killing, most of the book must cater to trying to make these sequences as exciting as possible. Collins' solution is a rather annoying one - to write certain passages entirely in italics to convey tension, rounding them off with exclamation marks.
I also felt that the three main characters were much more likeable on the screen than in the book; perhaps it was the charisma of the actors, perhaps it was refinements to the script; but Collins' renditions of O'Connell, Evelyn and Jonathan pale in comparison to what we saw on the screen. O'Connell comes across as arrogant and swaggering, Evelyn is stiff and uptight and Jonathan has lost most of his hilarious one-liners. One may argue that this is the way they are presented in the movie, but I tend to disagree: Brendan Fraser's O'Connell had bravado, but also a kind of goofy charm; Rachel Weisz's Evelyn was a tad nerdy, but also competent and sincere, and John Hannah stole the show as Jonathan - here he's just a periphery character. I'm not saying that any of these three characters were examples of fine character-studies, but they had a likeability that seems to have gone missing when captured on the page.
However, there are some nice touches in the book; the Egyptologist, the Warden and Evy's cat all get names, and there is some clarification on the rituals that Imhotep performs, something that was brushed over in the movie and so a tad confusing. It wasn't until reading this book that I realised that the warrior-mummies that Jonathan calls forth were the mummies of the Med-jai warriors and that Anck-su-namun's gold skin was body-paint put on her to ensure that no one but the Pharaoh touched her. Collins certainly did a lot of research into Egyptology, which brings puts the story in a solid context and adds a number of little details, as well as explaining some of the stuff that Imhotep got up to in the prologue.
But other things are just plain silly. Are we really meant to believe that a proper Englishwoman like Evelyn would creep into O'Connell's tent at night for "cuddling" because she was cold? How is it that O'Connell can call out to Evelyn to hurry up the deal with the Warden whilst he's being hung? (No, I haven't tried it personally, but I'm sure it's quite impossible to speak whilst being strangled in hangman's noose). Why does O'Connell keep calling Evelyn `baby', a term that wasn't used in such a way in the early 1920's? There are lots of these silly little mistakes (along with the aforementioned use of italics and bad characterisation) that can get annoying, and more obvious as the book goes on.
Yet on the other hand, perhaps this book should be approached in the same way as the movie - not at all seriously. For all I know Collins was commissioned to write the novelization and had very little control over what went in, and perhaps hard-core "Mummy" fans won't mind the mistakes too much. For me however, I'd recommend sticking to the movie.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Fun!, April 28, 2001
Max Allan Collins' novelization of the 1999 film "The Mummy" is a lot of fun. Which is of course what you would expect, since the movie itself was such pure unadulterated fun.It does what most good novelizations do, it fleshes out the characters a little more. It provides some background information on the characters and storyline. The novelization is also very helpful for explaining a bit more about the ancient Egyptian ceremony where Imhotep tries to resurrect his dead love, Anck-su-namun. The novel also focuses on the romance aspect between Evelyn and O'Connell, much more than the movie. If you enjoyed the recent Mummy movie, you would probably enjoy this book. It's a fun and fast read. As long as you don't expect anything more from it, you should enjoy this book.
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