Following their success with Curse of Frankenstein, Hammer set about doing versions of other famous monster tales – Dracula, Phantom of the Opera, Hound of the Baskervilles, and the Mummy (I’m surprised they never had a crack at the Invisible Man.) A contract with Universal enabled them to raid films in the mummy series: this borrows not just from the Karloff Mummy but also The Mummy’s Hand and the Mummy’s Ghost (and of course the stage version of Dracula, which inspired so much of the Karloff Mummy). This was made by the Hammer A team - Terence Fisher, Jimmy Sangster, Cushing, Lee – but it’s not one of their classics.
There’s an opening sequence in a faraway land where someone goes mad – cut back to England where said mad person is in a loony bin (Peter Cushing’s father – it’s weird seeing Cushing play someone’s son). Cushing isn’t quite right in the lead but Christopher Lee is effective as the mummy (not that much praise, I know, but he looks believable in flashback); the art design is typically excellent and there are some good (if too frequent) action sequences but the story gets a little dull at times.
The majority of the plot concentrates on the mummy getting revenge for being dug up but them throws in a Cushing’s-wife-looks-just-like-Lee’s-lost-love subplot towards the end; too little too late. Still, Hamer went on to make a number of other mummy films, including The Curse of the Mummy, The Mummy’s Shroud, and the Blood from the Mummy’s Tomb (the latter being a cursed production during the making of which director Seth Holt and Peter Cushing’s wife died).
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