From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Mummy
Original film poster
Directed by	Terence Fisher
Produced by	Michael Carreras
Written by	Jimmy Sangster
Starring	Peter Cushing Christopher Lee Yvonne Furneaux Eddie Byrne George Pastell
Release date(s)	September 25, 1959 (UK release)
Running time	88 min
Language	English
All Movie Guide profile
IMDb profile

The Mummy is a 1959 British Hammer Horror film starring Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing.

Though the title refers to Universal Studios's 1932 film The Mummy, the film actually derives its plot and characters entirely from two Universal later films, The Mummy's Hand and The Mummy's Tomb. It is one of several Hammer remakes of Universal films.

In Egypt in 1895, a team of archaeologists, including John Banning, his father Stephen Banning and his uncle Joseph Whemple, are searching for the tomb of Princess Ananka, the priestess of Karnak. John is held up by an injured leg while his father and uncle open the tomb. Before they enter, an Egyptian man named Mehemet Bey appears and warns them not to go in, lest they face dire consequences. Stephen and Joseph ignore him, and within find the sarcophogus of Ananka. When Joseph leaves to tell John the good news, Stephen finds the mythical Scroll of Life and reads from it. He then sees something that drives him into a catatonic state. John and Joseph continue excavating the tomb but cannot find the Scroll of Life, little suspecting it is now in the hands of Mehemet Bey.

Mehemet Bey brings Kharis to life.

Three years later in Engerfield, England in 1898, Stephen Banning comes out of his catatonic state at the Engerfield Nursing Home for the Mentally Disordered, and sends for his son. He tells him that when he read from the Scroll of Life, he accidentally brought to life Kharis, the mummified priest of Karnak and the eternal guardian of Princess Ananka's tomb, who was sentenced to eternal living death as punishment for his forbidden love for the princess. Now, Stephen says, Kharis will hunt down and kill all those who desecrated Ananka's tomb. John does not believe his father.

Meanwhile, Mehemet Bey, revealed as a devoted worshipper of Karnak, has come to Engerfield under the alias of Mehemet Akir to track down the Bannings. He hires a pair of drunken carters, Pat and Mike, to bring the slumbering Kharis in a crate to his rented home, but the two men foul up and Kharis' crate ends up falling into a pond. However using the Scroll of Life, Bey exhorts Kharis to break free of the crate and rise from the water, then sends him to murder Stephen Banning at the Engerfield Nursing Home. Soon after, Kharis is also sent to murder Joseph Whemple, doing so right before the eyes of John Banning, who shoots Kharis twice at close range with a revolver to no effect.

John Banning (right) and Inspector Mulrooney.

Scotland Yard Inspector Mulrooney is sent from London to solve the murders, but because he is skeptical and deals only in "cold, hard facts," he refuses to believe John's wild story about a killer mummy, even when John figures out that he is to be Kharis' third and final victim. While Mulrooney attempts to build his investigation by interviewing people who have seen Kharis, including the two carters, John notices that his wife, Isobel Banning, bears an uncanny resemblance to Princess Ananka. Mulrooney meanwhile slowly begins to come to the conclusion that John is right, and that there is indeed a mummy in Engerfield. Together he and John try to figure out who is controlling Kharis.

Mehemet Bey sends the dreaded mummy to the Bannings' home to slay his final victim. However, upon seeing Isobel, Kharis stops his attack on John and leaves. Bey mistakenly believes that Kharis has slain John, and is surprised when John turns up alive at his house, suspecting him of being the one controlling the mummy. After John leaves, Bey sends Kharis to make a second attempt on John's life, only this time John has Mulrooney as his bodyguard, and Kharis seems more interested in pursuing Isobel than he does following Bey's murderous orders...

Trivia sections are discouraged under Wikipedia guidelines. The article could be improved by integrating relevant items and removing inappropriate ones.

• Christopher Lee sustained multiple injuries making this film including a dislocated shoulder from an accidentally locked door, injuries to his knees and shins from the unseen pipes below the swamp's surface, burns from squibs used to simulate gunshots, and to his back from carrying Yvonne Furneaux.
• Peter Cushing's character walks with a limp in the film. While some have speculated that this was a real injury that was worked into the story, it can also be seen as a wry play on one of the canards of the old Universal Mummy films, in which the lame, shuffling mummy still manages to chase down people running at full speed. Here, the lame, shuffling hero manages to outrun the marauding mummy.
• The exterior scenes of John Banning's study, with its semi-circular windows, show the actual front (river-side) facade of Down Place, the manor house that was the core of Bray Studios.
• Christopher Lee is on record as calling this film the best looking film Hammer ever made, and the musical score the finest of any Hammer production.

Kharis abducts Isobel Banning.

• The Mummy at the Internet Movie Database