The Mummy: Year of the Scorpion
by Gaith
1999’s The Mummy remains the best archaeology-themed adventure movie since Raiders of the Lost Ark. The sequel was a disaster, but THE MUMMY RETURNS had had some worthwhile elements. This version carefully digs them out.
member ratings:
(2 votes, average: 7.50 out of 10, rated)
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original film name: The Mummy Returns
new film name : The Mummy: Year of the Scorpion
film studio name : Universal
edit crew name : Gaith
Date Original Film Was Released : 2001
Date Edit Was Released : February 2010
Original Runtime : 130 min
New Runtime : 66 min
Amount of time Cut/Added : ~67 minutes cut, a new 3-minute intro added
Fanedit details:
I honestly believe that (InfoDroid’s fan edits aside) 1999’s The Mummy remains the best archaeology-themed adventure movie since Raiders of the Lost Ark. And while there’s no question that The Mummy Returns was a travesty (not only overlong and boring, but positively damaging to the integrity of the first film’s characters), I think it does have an interesting core story.
To wit: The Mummy introduced two couples, Rick and Evelyn and Imhotep and Anck-su-namun. The Mummy Returns questions if their respective loves are indeed real, or simply infatuations. The perils of the Scorpion King’s pyramid will put both relationships to the test. Admit it… that’s a reasonably unique story hook for an action movie sequel, isn’t it?
Unfortunately, this decent and fun flick was buried under lame jokes, lazy plotting and frankly gross insinuations about Evy’s former life. If she’s partly an ancient Egyptian princess, then she’s also partly not her son’s mother, and that’s just messed up. I have therefore removed these noxious elements, as well as any narrative scenes that don’t inform the overall emotional arcs (viz., the Scorpion King intro).
Because at least two superfluous sequences could not be removed invisibly (Evy’s death, the collapsing oasis), I have added a handful of atmospheric title cards, as well as an introduction that humorously explains the necessity of their use. Thus, while my editing is not invisible, I nevertheless hope that the viewing experience is technically seamless. This unconventional method was a last resort, but I’m not apologizing for it. Besides, there may be future rescue attempts by the Des Moines Adventure Film Society! 
The changes:
• Added a prologue from The Mummy
• Removed all scenes before the O’Connell Manor
• Removed all references to Evy being a reincarnation of a long-dead princess. No, she isn’t.
• Numerous trims to the fight in the manor.
• Removed all references to Rick being a Medjai. This subplot had potential, but it’s superfluous.
• Shortened Imhotep’s reincarnation. Rick and Ardeth don’t encounter awkward mummies in the British Museum, and they certainly don’t watch the rites without making any effort to stop them.
• Various trims to the Museum sequence. Alex doesn’t talk about the golden pyramid’s diamond, Jonathan isn’t such a slobbering coward and the shootout is shortened.
• The bus chase has been almost entirely excised. It didn’t move the story forward, and we’ve already had a lot of action.
• We never see the painfully unfunny motley thugs alive. Who cares?
• Various trims to make Izzy less annoying. Rick no longer threatens to shoot him.
• Cut the twelve tribes of the Medjai. No way were there that many of ‘em!
• Cut Ardeth’s silly bird in all but one shot.
• Meela’s transformation into Anck-su-namun is now uninterrupted, and it’s in aged grayscale.
• Alex no longer makes sandcastles; he merely draws maps.
• The wall of water has been heavily reduced.
• Ardeth doesn’t hold his sword to Jonathan’s throat, nor does he talk about Anubis’ army.
• Numerous cuts to the pygmy attack to keep the story moving as quickly as possible.
• Rick doesn’t outrun the sun.
• Evy doesn’t die, nor does she get reincarnated and fight Anck. Jonathan doesn’t fight Anck either.
• The Medjai don’t fight the warrior-dogs… at all.
• The Rick vs. Imhotep fight is drastically reduced.
• Most of the close-ups on the CG Scorpion King’s face have been removed.
• The entire collapsing oasis scene is excised. Ahm Shere survives!
• Heavy cuts to the denouement. The credits are now greyscale. The title specifies that it’s an edit.
• Appended a Mummy 3 “best moments” reel.
Teaser Trailer: Available on the DVD.
DVD DETAILS
66 minutes Single Layer NTSC 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen with AC3-5.1 audio
LANGUAGE : ENGLISH (5.1)
MENUS : yes
SCENE SELECTION : yes
EXTRAS: Edit trailer, acknowledgements.
xvid avi details: COMING SOON
Fanedit history and making:
One warm summer day in 2001, I staggered into my Northern California house. I was nearly fifteen, and had just seen The Mummy Returns, the sequel to my second-favorite film, in a nondescript multiplex where the suburs bleed into the countryside, and the shimmering inland heat had made the car ride back an almost otherworldly experience. While an unusually loud sound system and the spectacle-filled extravaganza had, in conjunction with my considerable anticipation, somewhat dulled my senses, I was dimly aware that the film I’d just seen was not very good. The plot was underthought and often baffling; indeed, one dead character from the first film had somehow been resurrected before the events of the second, and with no explanation whatsoever. While some humorous moments – particularly in the film’s first half – recalled the sly self-referentiality that still makes its predecessor a lively watch, an alarming number of the jokes had fallen flat. And while the sumptuous costumes, majestic score and enchanting scenery had made for a thrilling cinematic experience, there had simply been far too much action that added little to the story or themes. (The celebrated film critic Roger Ebert agreed, writing “Imagine yourself on a roller coaster for two hours. After the first 10 minutes, the thrills subside.”) Still, while all my friends agreed with the popular consensus in labeling the film a disaster, I knew that the picture had had some worthwhile elements. Maybe someday, I thought, I could take to a computer and dig them out.
Throughout the following years, I never got that opportunity, and though I tried revisiting the film on serval occasions, I only became increasingly dismayed by the experience. Still, once or twice a year, I’d take wistful looks at screenshots collected online, and gradually memorized the complete sequence of scenes. I even came up with a favorite theory as to how the aforementioned reincarnation had occurred. My ambition to someday make a fan edit of my own never entirely subsided (indeed, I also found another film I wanted to redact almost as badly – 1985’s Weird Science), but until the summer of 2008, I continued to view any practical possibility of such an effort being at least a few years away. Thanks to the terrific folks of the Fan Edit Forum, however, my dream of eight years has been realized. It is therefore my honor to present to the fan editing community (and anyone who owns a legitimate copy of the theatrical cut) the result, The Mummy: Year of the Scorpion.
Hardware and software information:
Hardware: Windows XP, 500 mb RAM
Software:
• Womble MPEG Video Wizard
• Macromedia xRes (photoshop alternative)
• dvddecrypter
Time needed for the edition:
editing: a few weeks, off and on, including three or four full days of editing.
persons involved: Gaith
additional essay:
(I recommend that this piece be read before viewing The Mummy: Year of the Scorpion. While it doesn’t make up for The Mummy Returns‘ deficiencies, I hope that the depth it gives the characters makes for a more involving experience.)
Who the Duat is Meela Nais?
An Essay on “Meela Nais / Anck Su Namun” from The Mummy Returns
By Gaith, Fan Editor of The Mummy: Year of the Scorpion
One of the many discontents of The Mummy Returns is the seemingly arbitrary plotting concerning the character of “Meela Nais“.
The entire plot of the first Mummy, one recalls, came about due to Anck-Su-Namun’s treachery against the Pharaoh in indulging her desires with Imhotep, and the latter’s goal throughout that film was more or less limited to (in Beni’s phrasing) “bringing his dead girlfriend back to life.” One might therefore expect to be given some explanation for how “Anck” (as director Stephen Sommers and editor Bob Duscay refer to her) came to be reincarnated, even if only in body, in the form of “Meela Nais” in The Mummy Returns; alas, one would be wrong. This mini-essay, then, concerns my personal explanation of Meela’s history, and how it informed an editing choice for The Mummy: Year of the
Scorpion.
First, a disclaimer:
I have neither read any script for The Mummy Returns (none are, to my knowledge, publicly available) nor read the novelization. But then, I shouldn’t have to. It’s suspect enough when a supporting character is introduced outside of the bounds of a major franchise picture (I’m thinking specifically of “Kid” from the Matrix sequels, whose first exchange with Neo would mystify anyone not familiar with The Animatrix), but Anck isn’t a mere supporting character in The Mummy Returns. We should have been told who she is, and where she came from. (So far as I can tell, the name “Meela” is only spoken once, by Lock- Nah, in the British Museum.)
Happily, I have come up with a personal explanation not only for Meela’s origin and motives but also those of the British Museum’s Curator, Baltus Hafez. (The latter being another sorely under-written character.) In my formulation, Hafez was a lowly scholar who, in the course of some rather esoteric researches, found persuasive evidence that the
Scorpion King was due to reawaken in the 1930s. If he could somehow resurrect Imhotep, whom he had also found rare writings about, surely the latter could kill the Scorpion King, take control of his army, and rule the world. And Hafez would surely be granted dominion over a modest kingdom of his own.
The trick, of course, would be to make Imhotep feel a personal connection to him. Hafez knew that as soon as the twice-killed priest was resurrected, he would search for a female host for Anck’s soul (remember that in the first film, Imhotep chose Evelyn for this very purpose). Without the Book of the Dead, still lost in Hamunaptra, Hafez couldn’t summon spirits from the afterlife, but he somehow managed to acquire enough magic to shape the developing fetus of a pregnant woman. What better gift for Imhotep than a bodily incarnation of Anck herself? Thus was Meela, destined
to grow into the woman we see in The Mummy Returns‘ first half, born.
This explanation is supported by several scenes in which we see Hafez advising Meela on how best to protect and interact with Imhotep. However, it is also foiled entirely by a moment during Meela’s introduction to the newly-reincarnated Imhotep, when, after the latter declares that he will soon resurrect Anck in Meela’s body, thus making their love whole again, Hafez rolls his eyes and walks away. As such behavior is obviously incompatible with my designs on the character, I excised this beat in my edit.
—–
On another note: one Katie Sullivan makes an interesting conjecture as to why Anck didn’t rescue Imhotep at the end of the film, speculating that Meela’s spirit had not been entirely overwritten by the reincarnated other, and that it was Meela that abandoned the former high priest. While this could have been a very cool theme for the
movie to explore, it provides no evidence to support this idea.
Sullivan assumes, moreover, that the love between the two Egyptians is real. But is it? My personal reading is that they were only infatuated with each other in ancient Thebes, and the relative shallowness of their connection inspired Anck’s attempted flight.
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IMAGES:
cover art by avp (download here):
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A good edit. There are some “rough” areas that are noticeable but don’t really detract from the overall viewing.
I especially liked the “film restoration” style of this edit. Gaith took the worst part of this movie (the opening with The Rock) and made it a fun, classic horror movie part (much like the original 1930’s “The Mummy”). Gaith might have over-used the “damaged film” look a little too much in the opeing and there is a very rough edit/cut/transition to the main movie at this point, but overall it is a great start to a mediocre movie. The fade in and fade outs are a little too long (while dialogue has started or is still going as the fade starts/stops), but gain not so long as to seriously detract from the edit.
I DL’d the DVD version and the overall quality is good (4 out of 5), audio is good too (4/5).
Gaith has taken, for me, a very disappoiting film and made it a much better experience. I have a feeling others might take issue with the drastic reduction of “action”, but for me, it was what was needed. Honestly, I get very bored with long action scenes. I am glad Evy the re-icarnation plot references are gon as well as the too long Pygmy attack scenes – without the long-winded pygmy scenes, the movie becomes MUCH more quick-paced without losing plot.
Review by flyboy707 — December 14, 2009 @ 10:10 pm