An ancient princess is awakened from her crypt beneath the desert, bringing with her malevolence grown over millennia, and terrors that defy human comprehension.
The Mummy is a 2017 American action-adventure film directed by Alex Kurtzman and written by David Koepp, Christopher McQuarrie and Dylan Kussman, with a story by Kurtzman, Jon Spaihts and Jenny Lumet. It is a reboot of The Mummy franchise and the first installment in the Dark Universe film series. The film stars Tom Cruise, Annabelle Wallis, Sofia Boutella, Jake Johnson, Courtney B. Vance, Marwan Kenzari and Russell Crowe.
The Mummy premiered at the State Theatre in Sydney, Australia on May 22, 2017, and was theatrically released in the United States on June 9, 2017 in 2D, 3D and IMAX 3D. It received negative reviews from critics and has grossed $338 million.
Tom Cruise began talks about playing the lead in November 2015, with Sofia Boutella beginning talks that December. Kurtzman cast Boutella after seeing and being impressed by her largely mute performance in Kingsman: The Secret Service. Kurtzman noted that "if you look at her eyes, and this is what I got from watching Kingsman, there's a whole performance going on here. And in not saying anything but conveying that much to me, I thought oh my god, no matter how much prosthetics we put on her, no matter how much CG we put on her face, if I see this, she's going to convey something very emotional to me." Other casting news was announced between March and May, with Russell Crowe joining during the latter month. Shortly after the film opened Variety reported that Cruise had excessive control over the film and firm control of nearly every aspect of production and post-production, including re-writing the script and editing to his specifications, telling Kurtzman how to direct on set, and enlarging his role while downplaying Boutella's. Universal contractually guaranteed Cruise control of most aspects of the project, from script approval to post-production decisions.
The Mummy received negative reviews, with criticism aimed at its incoherent narrative and shoehorned plot points setting up the Dark Universe. On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 16% based on 217 reviews, with an average rating of 4.2/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "Lacking the campy fun of the franchise's most recent entries and failing to deliver many monster-movie thrills, The Mummy suggests a speedy unraveling for the Dark Universe." On Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating, the film has a score of 34 out of 100, based on 44 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews". On CinemaScore, audiences gave the film an average grade of "B−" on an A+ to F scale.