'THE MUMMY'........UNWRAPPED & UNRAVELED...........

The Mummy (2017)   You guessed it, dear BQ visitors.......you'll read no detailed review of this movie in our post......

            It would be far more appropriate to review the spreadsheets at the Universal Studios accounting department.........where basically movies like this originate.

           "The Mummy" can trace its ancestry to such Universal Corporate Spam as "Airport 1975" and "Earthquake"......packaged sausage.....and you don't want to read the ingredients.....

             Supposedly, this movie kicks off Universal's 'Dark Universe' series, their attempt to make bloated, CGI-heavy remakes of their classic 1930's monster films......

              This idea fills us with even more dread than that video of Putin's sooper-dooper nuclear missiles reigning down on Disney World and Miami Beach........either way, we're talkin' about a lot of unleashed bombs......

               Next one up (or so they threaten).....Javier Bardem in "Bride Of Frankenstein". Who's playing Javier's blushing bride? 

              We nominate Hope Hicks. We heard she's available......and has on-the-job training in dealing with a hulking monster with half a brain......

             But let's get back to "The Mummy", painful as it is.

             Tom Cruise?  Really?  Since the world's premier Scientology Kool-Aid drinker already amassed his "Mission Impossible" gazillions, we can only assume he gifted the Creepy-Crawlies who oversee his "religion"  with "Mummy" gazillions.

              Hopefully invested in a rocket ship to take them all to wherever that Tesla with the mannequin is headed......bon voyage, gang.

               There's one other good casting joke in the movie.....Russell Crowe as Dr. Jekyll and You-Know-Who.  We might have chuckled a little more if they'd cast Mel Gibson and he started calling the girl Mummy "sugar tits" as soon he transformed into Hyde......

              Let's forget about the acting in the movie itself.....not worth discussing. Let's focus on the nuanced, skilled performances that everyone gives in the "Making of..." bonus features on the
DVD and Blu Ray........

               You know these videos well. Cruise and company sit facing some offscreen, invisible person....(who the hell are they all talking to anyway?).....and excessively bloviate about the movie as if  they just finished making "Citizen Kane".......everybody gets to take their ego out for a little stroll........the only other place you'd find this massive level of bullshit would be at a Sara Huckabee Sanders press briefing.......

               Considering that they've climbed out of a cinematic cesspool, the level of sincere acting on display in these bonus videos impresses the hell out of us.....Oscar-worthy stuff, for sure.

               For the cast and crew in the Bonus Features, 3 stars (***).......for "The Mummy".....the big Zero (0). Here's praying this one permanently turns out the lights on the Dark Universe.......