1.  Introduction 
2.  Why Mummify 
3.  Mummification 
4.  Ancient Beliefs of Mummification 

1.  Introduction 
2.  Solving Mysterys with X-ray 
3.  Modern Body Embalming 
4.  Mummies of the Future 

1.  Introduction 
2.  Movies 
3.  Arts and Ethnics 

    hits since
  1 April 2003

A classic horror film told in a sobering way without going for shock effects, but with plenty of spooky scenes. Director Karl Freund was born in Bohemia and grew up in Berlin. He was primarily known as a great cameraman who emigrated to the States in 1929 and first worked on The Boudoir Diplomat. In 1931 he teamed with Tod Browning to do Dracula. He makes his auspicious debut as a director in The Mummy.

The film was created by Nina Wilcom Putnam, who wrote a nine-page story entitled "Cagliostro," based on the Svengali-like hypnotist. Richard Schayer, head of the Universal story department, developed the short story into a treatment. John Lloyd Balderston (he worked on the Dracula script) took this story, retained a few elements, and fashioned a new one designed to tie it in with the idea of a mummy's curse, based on the sensationalized stories of King Tut's tomb which were popular during the early 1920s.

This is actually the very first movie to have used ancient mummies as a topic. The story of living mummies is appealing due to the recent discovery of King Tut's tomb. The content of the story is similar to "The Mummy", a movie that was made in the recent years and enjoyed almost as much fame as its predecessors.

The idea of walking mummies was never a part of Egyptian folklore and was merely Hollywood hokum. This is according to Dennis Fischer the author of "Horror Film Directors, 1931-1990."

The location of Egypt is proclaimed as the film's setting, and the title says a 1922 Field Expedition by the British Museum is in progress. There are three archeological scholars intently examining their latest discovery: Imhotep's Mummy (Karloff-with a great makeup job by Jack Pierce) and a gilded sealed box containing the fabled Scroll of Thoth. The three scholars are: Sir Joseph Whemple (Arthur Byron) and his assistant Norton (Bramwell Fletcher), who are examining their find but are warned by their other colleague, the occultist Dr. Muller (Edward Van Sloan), that whoever opens the box and brings the Mummy back to life will receive an ancient curse of eternal damnation.

Boris Karloff gave an amazingly restrained performance that fits the mood of the film to a tee. The story was fascinating hokum and its originality spawned a flood of such horror genre films, but few could come close to it in spirit and integrity of storytelling. My favorite line in the flick is when Sir Joseph says, " The British Museum is interested in knowledge and not treasures."