Member-only story
The O’Connell’s: they don’t make them like this anymore
Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz are the kind of protagonists we should get back.
Whenever I finish watching The Mummy (1999) I experience two rather antithetical emotions. First, I feel like a kid again believing in ludicrous fantasies such as mummies, ancient curses, brain-eating beetles and true love. However, the second is one of pure sadness. I feel that Stephen Sommer’s brilliant take of combining horror with a couple of proper good laughs has been lost for quite some time.
Frankly, I don’t think that combination could’ve worked so well without one of its greatest pillars: its truly amazing protagonists. Many films, usually from a long time ago, such as Jaws, 12 Angry Men and Clueless; it’s not hard to see the beautiful crafting done by both actors and writers when it comes to making their characters feel alive.
We need both disciplines, acting and writing going mano a mano or otherwise the film simply won’t work. Sadly, making compelling characters happens to be a quite hard task. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be bitching about it today.
I’m not afraid to say that this film is one of the best action/horror/comedy films I will ever see in my lifetime. I claim such an outrageous opinion for the fact that I still haven’t seen anything from the past or the future that has came…
