Director: Lisa Palenica
Year: 2013
Country: USA
Alternate Titles: Isis Rising: Curse of the Lady Mummy
Genre: Mummy
Plot:
Trying to conduct their studies, a group of students trying to conduct a study on ancient Egyptian artifacts find themselves accidentally resurrecting a powerful mummy queen inside the museum who begins a rampage in the museum to bring her dead lover back to life forcing them to stop her.
Review:
This was a decent enough if troubling genre effort. Among the better features here is the solid and worthwhile storyline that the main feature revolves around. This idea of the human form of the mummy carrying on her affair and trying to stay involved with him through death which is what the group uncovers as a result of their studies at the site creates a worthwhile form of motivation to bring the figure back to life and carry out its plans. With this servicing well enough for introducing the rampage which has a nice bit of action here with the discovery of the bodies left around the site and leading to the realization that they're trapped inside, this produces a solid enough bit of action as well as some bloody gore for these bodies to give everything some fun in this section with the increasingly paranoid group trying to find out what's going on and get a way out. That all gives everything a bit of fun to have for its positives.
There are some issues holding this one down. One of the main issues with the film is the generally lackadaisical pacing that renders a lot of what's going on here completely uninteresting in the slightest. Far too much of the first half consists of the unusually inappropriate class of students sent to study genuine Egyptian artifacts at a museum without proper supervision or context causes this to stumble along quite lethargically. Not only is the somewhat worthwhile story so lazily constructed that it's filled with plot holes and logic gaps about what they're there, but the whole idea of a group of college-level grad students acting as immaturely as they are regarding the sacredness of the situation and hurling grade-school insults at each other sticks out immensely as not being truly appropriate for this type of film. Moreover, this leaves so little of the film to concentrate itself on the rampage that it takes forever to get the creature resurrected that it can get boring waiting for something to happen with all this going on instead.
The other real issue to contend with is the rather underwhelming special effects featured here which really highlight how cheap this one really is. The general look and feel of the museum basement where most of the action takes place is a prime example with the majority of the scenes featuring a flimsy background so fake it shakes at several points where characters touch it accidentally ruining the illusion significantly. That the mummy is a human figure not even wrapped in bandages is a grave mistake and a bizarre body-hopping possession power is added to make some form of a human figure to fight when it gets to be involved. That carries over to the rather obvious CGI effects ranging from everything including smoke rings being blown, the special demonstrations of the black magic being utilized, or just enhancing the powers of the mummy which are so silly-looking it looks incredibly goofy and cheap. It's all enough to lower this one overall.
Overview: **.5/5
A somewhat watchable indie mummy effort, this one has enough to like about it to be a decent enough if not entirely grandiose genre effort due to its flaws. Those who are fine with its positives and not turned off by its negatives will have the most to like here while most others out there should heed caution with this one.
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