"The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor" is an indelicious admixture of Hollywood and Hong Kong exploitation flicks. To be precise, it has three of the four basis elements of the genre: gratuitous violence, special effects and assorted mayhem, yes; naked flesh, not so much. Oh, well, you can't have it all.
Still, this "Mummy" tries very, very hard to do all, to be all, from an intergalactic-sized avalanche, to abominable snowmen flying through the air (if Yeti are always men, how does the species survive?), to one of the least convincing romances in movie history - between two ghastly young principal actors, Luke Ford and Isabella Leong.
Their underachievement, along with embarrassing performances - in the leading roles, no less - by Brendan Fraser and Maria Bello is all the more significant in the starry presence of Michelle Yeoh and Jet Li. A mix, indeed, ugh.
One must believe in mummies in order to source the current overwhelming curse on Hollywood, of countless comic-book, super-hero, special-effect permits to print money with movies devoid of (non-monetary) value. And now the blitz has gone multicultural, but not in a good way.
This third film in a series hearkens back to the fictional Emperor Han (another mix here, of China's real first emperor, Ying Zheng, also known as Qin Shi Huangdi, and of a ruthless character in search of eternal life), his betrayal of the wizard (Yeoh) who could have helped him, and her curse on him. Han is Jet Li, not so much a mummy as a flaking metal statue, almost constantly on fire, and fairly walking through this misdirected mess. The misdirector is Rob Cohen, of "The Fast and the Furious," someone who can provide scenes, but nothing beyond them.
From the opening scene between Li and Yeoh, establishing the origins of the story, "Mummy" moves to an exciting fly-fishing scene in England, where retired Indiana-wannabe Fraser hooks himself in the neck. Things get worse when he goes home to a similarly retired but more cheerful and less awkward wife (Bello) for an evening of strained inactivity. Ford is their son, skipping school in China to discover the whole Han terracotta army and the mummified/metalized/fire-breathing emperor. And so it goes, for 112 minutes. (The Korean version is one minute shorter, and one wonders which crucial 60 seconds Koreans have been denied.)
Still, this "Mummy" tries very, very hard to do all, to be all, from an intergalactic-sized avalanche, to abominable snowmen flying through the air (if Yeti are always men, how does the species survive?), to one of the least convincing romances in movie history - between two ghastly young principal actors, Luke Ford and Isabella Leong.
Their underachievement, along with embarrassing performances - in the leading roles, no less - by Brendan Fraser and Maria Bello is all the more significant in the starry presence of Michelle Yeoh and Jet Li. A mix, indeed, ugh.
One must believe in mummies in order to source the current overwhelming curse on Hollywood, of countless comic-book, super-hero, special-effect permits to print money with movies devoid of (non-monetary) value. And now the blitz has gone multicultural, but not in a good way.
This third film in a series hearkens back to the fictional Emperor Han (another mix here, of China's real first emperor, Ying Zheng, also known as Qin Shi Huangdi, and of a ruthless character in search of eternal life), his betrayal of the wizard (Yeoh) who could have helped him, and her curse on him. Han is Jet Li, not so much a mummy as a flaking metal statue, almost constantly on fire, and fairly walking through this misdirected mess. The misdirector is Rob Cohen, of "The Fast and the Furious," someone who can provide scenes, but nothing beyond them.
From the opening scene between Li and Yeoh, establishing the origins of the story, "Mummy" moves to an exciting fly-fishing scene in England, where retired Indiana-wannabe Fraser hooks himself in the neck. Things get worse when he goes home to a similarly retired but more cheerful and less awkward wife (Bello) for an evening of strained inactivity. Ford is their son, skipping school in China to discover the whole Han terracotta army and the mummified/metalized/fire-breathing emperor. And so it goes, for 112 minutes. (The Korean version is one minute shorter, and one wonders which crucial 60 seconds Koreans have been denied.)