Fans of The Mummy (1999), buckle your seatbelts, because THR just dropped some big news. According to a report from the site, Radio Silence (Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett), the filmmakers behind Ready or Not and Abigail, have signed on to direct a fourth installment in the franchise! Even more exciting than that? Both Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz are set to return!
Said THR, “One source describes the project as not a reboot, but rather a sequel that would disregard the events of the third movie.“
David Coggeshall (Orphan: First Kill) wrote the screenplay.
Released in 1999, Stephen Sommers’ action-adventure horror tale centered around an unlikely trio of heroes who must work together to take down an ancient mummy after he comes back to life and wreaks havoc in search of his long-lost love. The film was a box-office monster that spawned two sequels and a prequel (remember The Scorpion King? Eh, maybe not), itself a remake of the Universal 1932 classic. Universal attempted another reboot of The Mummy in 2017, starring Tom Cruise as part of their “Dark Universe“, but we all know how that went.
Much of the success of the 1999 The Mummy is owed to Fraser and Weisz.
The chemistry between the characters of Rick O’Connell (Fraser) and Evelyn (Weisz) is one so charming, it mesmerizes. Each came back for The Mummy Returns, though only Fraser went on to appear in The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon. Still, all three films raked in over $400 million worldwide. Not too shabby. In an editorial Chad Collins penned on the film, he wrote, “The Mummy has a vision. It may not reconcile with the praxis of classic cinema, of auteur theory, but for me—and many others—it’s one of the most important movies ever made.”
When it comes to why the 2017 Mummy didn’t work, Fraser once told Variety, “It is hard to make that movie. The ingredient that we had going for our Mummy, which I didn’t see in the new one, was fun. That was what was lacking in that incarnation. It was too much of a straight-ahead horror movie. The Mummy should be a thrill ride, but not terrifying and scary.”
Well, with Radio Silence directing and both Fraser and Weisz returning, I think it’s fair we can expect this fourth Mummy film to be a pretty fun ride. Stay tuned to Dread Central as we learn more.
Categorized: News
