Drive-In Dust Offs: The Mud & Magic of Hammer’s THE MUMMY (1959)

By the late 1950s, England’s Hammer Films was a creative and commercial juggernaut and their newfound bread and butter was horror. The Curse of Frankenstein (‘57) and Horror of Dracula (‘58) were huge hits, and Universal encouraged Hammer to rummage through their kitchen for more lucrative edibles. The Mummy (‘59) was the result–a colorful and creepy take on the mythos with the third terrific pairing of Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing. 

This version isn’t a direct remake of the 1932 Boris Karloff vehicle, but rather takes elements from a couple of Universal’s sequels (The Mummy’s Hand, The Mummy’s Tomb, The Mummy’s Zaddy) and weaves them into a very simple yet effective story. As such: It’s 1895, and all the hip archeologists of the day–Stephen Banning (Felix Aylmer), his son John (Peter Cushing), and John’s uncle Joe (Raymond Huntley)--are gathered in the Egyptian desert (or a British movie backlot; tomay-to, tomah-to). While John lay ill with a broken leg, Stephen and Joe locate the tomb of High Priestess Ananka (Yvonne Furneaux), who once ruled under the god Karnak. An attempt to stop them from entering by local Egyptian Mehemet Bey (George Pastell), who warns them of the dangers of desecration, fails and they find Ananka’s sarcophagus along with a secret scroll for resurrection. When Joe heads back to camp to tell John, a scream is heard from the tomb and racing back, Joe finds Stephen slumped over the sarcophagus catatonic and perhaps in need of some rest.

Three years later we’re back in England at a posh mental facility, and Stephen shakes off his catatonia and asks for John. He tells him that reading the Scroll of Life brought back Ananka’s mummified guardian Kharis (Lee) to life, to seek vengeance on the desecrators of the tomb. 

One by one the muddy and bandaged Kharis enacts his revenge; when he sees that John’s wife Isobel (Furneaux again) is the spitting image of Ananka, he sets his sights on reclaiming his queen… will any of London’s film lots be safe from the wrath of The Mummy? 

It feels like we’ve always had mummy movies throughout the history of horror; as a little kid in the ‘70s, I would read about and see black-and-white pictures of Boris Karloff, his makeup a chilling roadway of dark rutted lines beneath an immaculate black fez. We always had mummies stumbling around in kids’ fare like Scooby-Doo, with unraveling bandages showing the utter disregard for said monster. 

It’s the way it’s always been though, the mummy relegated to the basement with various supernatural creatures from lagoons and swamps mixing with laboratory rejects from all walks of life. The lower caste in the horror world, not forgotten, but not as cherished as your vampires and large stitched-together men. 

I think the fault lies with the concept: Who wants to beat up a burn patient? Not me, and I would hope you’d feel the same. The wrapping and the slow lurch are the two main characteristics of the mummy, and until Universal’s wildly successful reboot with Brendan Fraser as something closer to Indiana Jones, the mummy appearances were sporadic. 

This iteration of The Mummy is my favorite for several reasons: First, a course correction for the mummy’s appearance. After a swamp dump, Kharis becomes a grungy, mud-caked avenger, with Lee’s wild and expressive eyes conveying all of his focused rage. His stature is changed as well; no more foot drags as Kharis now walks upright and leads with his shoulders, giving him a much needed intensity–an urgency–that previous mummies have lacked. Kharis moves with a stopless determination not terribly removed from our modern day slasher anti-heroes. 

Second, the gorgeous cinematography by Jack Asher, the (mostly) lean screenplay by Jimmy Sangster, and the assured direction of Terence Fisher are all in place just like the first two features with their stars, Lee and Cushing. This is the lushest of the three, primary colors bursting, especially in the flashback scenes of Ananka’s death and Kharis’ attempt to resurrect her, leading to his curse of retribution. (Yeah I’m not sure how some of these rules are meted out myself.) That is the only weak spot in Sangster’s script and the film; it crawls when it becomes a, albeit interesting, history lesson. Fisher makes the most of the limited killings, creating suspense through the swift and single-minded hatred of Kharis and the urgency that Cushing’s John Banning brings to finding him. 

Third is the dance of its stars Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing, once more twisting in the cinematic sky for our pleasure and surely theirs. They have little interaction here (hard to write conversations when one of your characters has no tongue, I’ve been told) but when they do, it reminds you of that charge they have on the screen, specific to them. 

What is that chemistry, anyway? It’s a combination of Cushing’s resolve, with anger always bubbling under, and specifically here, Lee’s blinding, furious flurry of retribution, which gives the film a jolt regardless of their shared screen time. 

But let’s talk monsters, and Lee, for a second. All three of his Hammer/Universal monsters (this and the two before) are wonderfully unique in thought and look, and his mummy, though silent, feels deadlier through the majesty of Lee’s movements than all those who bandaged up before. The sharp contrast between the fiery whites of Kharis’ eyes and the dark impurity of his dress helps give The Mummy its juice. It’s certainly enough to call it up from the basement.

The Mummy is available on Blu-ray from Warner Bros.