A Plan9Crunch analysis
from Joseph Gibson
Previous Recent Kharis
Reviews:
https://planninecrunch.blogspot.com/2024/08/the-mummys-hand-reviewing-kharis.html
https://planninecrunch.blogspot.com/2024/08/the-mummys-tomb-reviewing-kharis.html
https://planninecrunch.blogspot.com/2024/08/the-mummys-ghost-reviewing-kharis.html
Please forgive the title
and format change for this review series; in my head, this was quite clever and
apt. By this point in the Kharis tetralogy, there was no substantial
creative figure I can find that was still in the franchise that had been previously.
(Each film had a different director, but writer Griffin Jay and producer Ben
Pivar were the constants before this, but now Bernard Schubert has taken over
writing arguments, based on a story from Leon Abrams and Dwight V. Babcock,
while Oliver Drake is the producer.) There is really no single piece of
this creative experience that was present from the days of the Mummy’s Hand, so
I thought why not make my review match that in some way.
It brings to mind the
thought paradox of the Ship of Theseus. If every piece of the whole has
been swapped out, is it even the same ship anymore, and at what point did it
change? This is still a Kharis film, with Ananka and the evil mysterious
High Priests, but Kharis isn’t Tom Tyler, Ananka isn’t Ramsay Ames and not only
are the Priests called Arkam not Karnak now but Andoheb, our main tether to
this cult, is gone. The setting also, rather bizarrely, is different
now. Some of these changes happened gradually, with tethers to the old
still present, but ripping off the Band-aid with how different this film is
even from the last one raises a certain question. Is this still even the
same series anymore? I would say yes, but you’ll have to be in suspense
as to my reasoning for quite a while. Despite also starting this review
differently than before, I, like Kharis, am still here, for better or for worse
and this review is built on my previous analyses of this series, just like the
movie is built on his previous escapades.
Of Name
Discrepancies
Because I was unsure how
fully to commit to the Ship of Theseus bit, I actually watched this film not on
my captioned dvd but on Internet Archive without captions: in a completely
different format which also happened to correspond to a different experience.
Consequently, and it is actually very interesting this happened, I cannot say
for sure what certain character names are (and neither can internet
sources). Does Kay Harding play Betty Ward as IMDB claims or Betty Walsh
(wikipedia)? It certainly sounds more like Walsh, and her uncle is named
Walsh. Is Peter Coe’s High Priest character named Doctor Ilzor Zardad or
Ilzor Zardaab? Those would sound similar
no matter what, so I don’t lean one way or the other.
I generally trust
Wikipedia (or at least the sources it links to) more than IMDB, but Wikipedia
also calls Tante Berthe’s Cafe (the sign clearly visible multiple times in the
movie) a pub. It is really interesting to me that there is such a large
disagreement and even more interesting that I got to be a part of that
experience by accidentally taking away the option to have an answer. The
name differences do not matter all that much in the grand scheme of
things. I will call Ilzor Ilzor and Betty Betty (the funny thing about
that is that this is also how the credits refer to them, just their first
names).
The Beginning of the
Movie
This film is set in
rural Louisiana (somehow Kharis, Peanuts, Tom and the mob in the last movie all
made the 1382-mile trek from Massachusetts to Louisiana during that climactic
chase scene) and opens at the Tante Berthe’s Cafe with a musical number from
Tante Berthe. Character Cajun Joe hits on her and seems somewhat like a
sleazeball but one they put up with, while another character named Achilles
alludes to Kharis being around as a town legend after winding up in the swamp
25 years before.
The actual plot begins
when the Southern Engineering Company, represented through belligerent Pat
Walsh (Betty’s uncle), aims to drain the swamp that contains Kharis, much to
everyone else’s chagrin on account of a recent disappearance and murder
attributed to The Mummy or Rougarou/Loup-Garou (pesky captionless print; the Rougarou and
Loup-Garou are technically different and either would make sense in this context). Two
doctors from the Scripps Museum (which previously housed Ananka), Ilzor and
James Halsey, show up to try to reclaim Kharis and Ananka from the swamp.
Ilzor, it turns out, is there to reclaim them not for the museum but for the
cult.
Now, there has been at
the very least a 25 year time skip, and seemingly Ilzor and another character
already planted in the Louisiana town called Ragheb (Martin Kosleck’s
character) are all that remain of the cult of Arkam. It makes enough
sense, given how Andoheb sent The Beggar, Mehemet Bey, and Yousef Bey into
dangerous scenarios that got them killed, that Andoheb might have run this cult
into the ground offscreen (even if that is a little contrived), but I will
actually commend the detail that Ilzor was planted in the museum. As far
as damage control following Dr. Ayad figuring out the secret of the tana
leaves, it makes sense for the cult to infiltrate their enemies. (As for how Andoheb would know about that, The Mummy's Ghost showed both him and Yousef to be very adept at interpreting information from the gods in prayer.) It just
feels like there is a film missing where a dying Andoheb sent Ilzor as their
last hope to revive Kharis and annihilate anyone who knows their secret and
where Kharis somehow wound up in Louisiana.
Ilzor at least has
learned from Yousef’s mistake of trying to outright control Kharis by trying to
reason with him mostly. This brings us to the obligatory backstory
explanation with stock footage where Ilzor instructs Ragheb in their tana
ritual, and the caretaker of the monastery where they are keeping Kharis
arrives only for Kharis to kill him. Ilzor informs Kharis that he will
have to find Ananka, and, throughout these scenes, the tana leaves are once
again confusing. Three to keep Kharis alive is mentioned again (though he
would have spent 25 years without any, so does he need them for his heart to
beat?), but there is a scene where an already moving Kharis is given his 9 tana
leaves (9 are supposed to give him motivation and movement, but consistently,
he has been already moving to receive those 9, so he should be uncontrollable
in all the films, which he admittedly is in these last two but for character
reasons, not tana reasons).
The Return and Recasting
of Princess Ananka
Next, a hand and later a
body emerge from dirt nearby the swamp. This being walks stiffly, like a
Mummy, from being caked in mud, but the sunlight above empowers her to walk
normally after she washes off. This is Virginia Christine’s Princess
Ananka.
Now, this hardly feels
like the same character as Ramsay Ames in the previous film, and that is
technically both a good and bad thing. Amina was trapped between two
battling identities, and the amnesia here should serve as a reset for at least
one of those personalities. If last time the spirit of Ananka inhabited
the normally witty Amina, this time the amnesiac Princess Ananka should be our
true introduction to this character as she uncovers at least one of her dormant
personalities. In this movie, she alternates between a bubbly and helpful
nature that is knowledgeable about Egyptology or almost full catatonia where
all she can do is mutter Kharis, run from the mummy and pass out.
It is in her less lucid
moments that Cajun Joe finds her, tells her he can take her to find help, goes
through the side door of Tante Berthe’s cafe, lays her on the bed, and,
surprisingly, actually does go get Tante Berthe for help, leaving to get the
doctor once Tante Berthe starts helping Ananka. I don’t want to allude
too much to R rated subject matter, but this scene, especially with the context
of Cajun Joe as a bit of lecherous Ne’er-do-well, resembles a particular kind
of heinous assault especially with Ananka being groggy (implicitly the
moonlight and Arkam magic have a drug like effect on her to achieve this
state), and I will applaud the film for subverting this imagery to henceforth
establish Cajun Joe as a very strong and moral character. It actually
contextualizes why the beginning of this film is structured so that we start in
Tante Berthe’s with him and not with the remaining priests of Arkam as per usual.
We have already seen the Mummy and the priests, but there is still suspense to
be had in establishing the dynamics of these new townsfolk.
Next, Kharis finds her
and kills Tante Berthe, the fleeing Ananka winding up with Halsey, Betty and
Dr. Cooper, but, before I get into that, I would like to finish discussing
Ananka as a character. As I mentioned, her catatonic and absentminded
moments tend to correspond either to nighttime (a good plot justification for
setting the action during the scarier nighttime) or odd circumstances involving
Arkam priests that said priests take credit for (her mind goes blank when she
sees Ilzor during the next day, and he claims that he was trying to lure her
back to Kharis in that moment). During the day, specifically when the sun
is up, she shows greater humanity, as she is an agreeable and knowledgeable
person that can help Halsey out by identifying and dating Kharis’ wraps because
the wrappings were different in Amenophis’ era than after apparently.
The film treats this
like Ananka surfacing, but Ananka would only know the Amenophis wrappings and
not be able to compare across the centuries, right? We have never seen
Arkam cultists talk about the specifications of the wrappings; it is Amina that
associated closely with Egyptologist Professor Norman and checked out books
from the college. (That said, it is possible that Ananka, however long her
spirit was in the Scripps Museum, may have observed figures like Steve Banning
or Dr. Ayad in their studies, but if she can’t remember either earthly
existence, why would she remember her ghostly one?)
The Mummy’s Curse
The scenes of Kharis
chasing her and their dueling motifs make for very interesting cinema to
analyze. She is at her strongest in the sun but still cannot remember
herself (or ultimately escape her fate of being recaptured and magically
mummified), and Kharis is at his strongest during the moonlight but is a slow-moving
slave to his tragic pursuit of love. There are moments where Ananka or
the people protecting her are right in his grasp, but they move on without even
noticing he was there. Moments like that work well for tension because we
have already seen his sheer power and brutal effectiveness, but it also
communicates a pathetic tragedy, otherwise called “The Mummy’s Curse”.
He’s almost more of a ghost than a man and very out of focus in this film by
comparison to the last while still carrying out his will where it intersects
with the priests (though still also a downgrade in autonomy).
The focus of this chase scene is on Ananka, engulfed in almost total darkness, an effectively scary scene because we, like Ananka, cannot see much of anything and do not know the layout, but Kharis is still out there, far closer than we realize. When she ends up with Halsey and Betty, they step into more important roles and each survive confrontations with Ragheb and Kharis respectively, while all Kharis gets is a few more kills, an only somewhat frustrating climactic choice and finally to be buried and eventually put on display at the Scripps Museum.
Leading up to the
climax, Kharis kills Dr. Cooper and destroys Betty’s tent to abduct Ananka,
while Cajun Joe helps out in a search party for Ananka, Ragheb leads Betty into
a trap, and Halsey follows Kharis to find Ragheb killing Ilzor (because Ragheb
rather abruptly wants to take on Betty as a sinful bride). Kharis can
really play only the role of predator here; Chaney really isn’t given a chance
to act much opposite Ananka, but his murders are fine. I dislike that he
ends up killing Cajun Joe for how much I actually appreciate the character, but
Joe wasn’t really the lead of this ensemble, just the character who did the
most for others, so his death means more than Achilles, the bartender or Goobie
would.
Climax
Once the remaining core
characters are all at the monastery, Ragheb and Halsey fight, and, first, I
will just say this might be the most obligatory final fight between a
designated protagonist and designated antagonist in any of these Classic
Universal Monsters films. Halsey and Ilzor had a connection, and Halsey
grew suspicious of Ilzor briefly when he was trying to lure Ananka to Kharis,
but this finale can proceed as if those scenes did not happen, a very bizarre
choice. Rather than flowing from a movie’s worth of buildup, Halsey and
Ragheb are fighting because of only the most recent plot points, which is still
logical, just not cathartic.
The more important part
of this sequence is when Kharis turns on Ragheb, and, again, it makes sense in
context but does not have much foreshadowing. I like the idea that Kharis
is so fed up with these priests failing, that he’ll kill them when they fall to
temptation even when their temptation isn’t Ananka, and I also kind of like the
idea that Kharis will be out of focus for most of this movie as part of the
tragedy of his character, but I don’t think the film’s execution in weaving
these plot threads together is exceptionally good. Ragheb has no chance
from the moment Kharis goes after him, meaning this ending is entirely reliant
on the spectacle of the monastery falling around them (which is admittedly well
done). It is just also strange for Kharis to single out Ragheb, when
Ragheb is the only person there that isn’t trying to take Ananka and Kharis
back to the museum (this is Halsey’s whole reason for being there, and Ilzor
should have told Kharis, while the denouement reveals that Betty plans to go
with Halsey).
Making Ilzor the one to
go after Betty would already make the climax more personal for Halsey (because
the film decided for some reason he should be the lead instead of Cajun Joe),
but it also would for Kharis, since Ragheb was only being instructed on how to
care for Kharis by Ilzor, and it was Ilzor that demanded far less of and seemed
for helpful to Kharis than any previous master. For Kharis to lose that
at the same time as Ananka (who he barely interacts with in this climax) and
have to fight his way out would be very interesting.
What we have is
serviceable because Kharis still does lose the most benevolent and powerful
master he had ever had, but I think it is undeniable that it would have been
more interesting for Ilzor to be the final foe based on the same reason it was
most interesting for Edelmann to be the final foe in House of Dracula: inserts
an extra layer of tragedy while also engineering a scenario where our hero
monster is the underdog. Imagine for a moment a polished version of The
Mummy’s Curse where Ilzor, as in the film, very carefully navigates his cult’s
calling with satiating Kharis, feeding Kharis and trying to help him find
Ananka while using his magic only on Ananka for that goal, until he does yield
to his temptations and then does have to fight Kharis. The fight between an
Arkam cultist at full power and Kharis, technically the weakest he has been in
this series but the most motivated, not only carries proper tension and is
based on the natural momentum of this series but also is the kind of fight I
would expect to lead to a destroyed monastery, Ananka somehow becoming mummified
and all the nearby tana leaves being destroyed. As is, those just kind of
happen, with the shallow justification that this is the final film.
I don’t want to spend
too much time here pitching a different film, because that isn’t really film
criticism, but unless I am missing some important symbolism, the filmmakers
choosing this ending over any other possibilities really weakens the
foundations of this story and makes it seem less interesting. Do you, the
reader, still remember or care as much about the tense Cajun Joe subversion now
that the film has decided he, our introductory character, is not important
enough to have a stake in the climax? If I hadn’t brought up the
differing styles of Ilzor to previous High Priests, would you remember that
when the final image the director Leslie Goodwins chose to show us was Kharis
turning on Ragheb after the latter’s temptation was more abrupt than Yousef
Bey’s (which itself required an act of god)?
Conclusion
If any one of these films qualifies as a cash grab, it would be The Mummy’s Curse. If any one of these films would most benefit from polishing, additional drafts and a longer runtime, it would be this one (and that is saying a lot since that is true of all of these Kharis movies). And, as I’ve already mentioned, this film is the odd one out, the Ship of Theseus, but it still does enough interesting things with the mythology of Kharis and Ananka (the sun and moon contrast is very simple but also really interesting) and the tragedy of both to have a place in this series.
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