The Makers of The Mummy

This chapter evaluates the visual fields of direction, performances, and effects in the making of The Mummy (1932). While it was Richard Schayer and Nina Wilcox Putnam who laid out the earliest version of The Mummy's storyline, it was John L. Balderston who reworked it from a muddled mixture of magic and mad science to a narrative that defined a subgenre. The chapter considers Karl Freund's directorial approach to The Mummy. Freund's approach to the fantastic is subtle and understated; nowhere is this clearer than in the iconic prologue, where the mummy is largely out-of-shot following the initial close-ups of its opening eyes and languid arm movements. Many filmmakers would have shown the mummy's actions directly, but Freund understood that powerful images could be created through restraint, allowing the viewer's imagination to fill in the details. The chapter then looks at the performances of Boris Karloff, Zita Johann, and Edward Van Sloan. It also highlights the role of Universal Pictures' resident cosmetic genius, film make-up artist Jack Pierce.

From Cagliostro to Imhotep: The Writing Process

This chapter examines how The Mummy (1932) took shape at Universal Pictures, and the significant transformations that it underwent along the way. When Howard Carter discovered Tutankhamun's tomb in November of 1922, he started a wave of cultural enthusiasm for all things ancient Egyptian. ‘Tutmania’ had peaked by the start of the 1930s, but it was sufficiently fresh in the public mind for Universal's head of production, Carl Laemmle Jr., to sense a commercial opportunity. And so, in early 1932, Laemmle decided that Universal's next horror film would have an Egyptian theme. The first requirement was to produce a plot, and Laemmle handed this assignment to a pair of writers: Universal scenario department head Richard Schayer, and established novelist Nina Wilcox Putnam. They responded with a nine-page synopsis entitled Cagliostro. Despite its glaring differences from the finished product, the synopsis planted the seed for what would become The Mummy.

Conversations with The Mummy: Critical Reactions

This chapter describes the critical reception of The Mummy (1932). When the film was screened, professional film critics were intrigued by the central figure of Boris Karloff, the actor who had been transformed into a living mummy. The Los Angeles Times even offered a prescient take that foresaw Karloff's future place in the film pantheon. As for the film itself, however, the critical reception was more lukewarm. Critics who had grown tired of horror cinema found little in The Mummy to change their opinions. The chapter then looks at re-evaluations and later evaluations of the film. Critics continue to find weaknesses, but they also continue to find rewarding new ways of approaching The Mummy. On the whole, The Mummy has managed to stand firm despite early critical indifference and subsequent changes in audience tastes. The film's position as the start of a subgenre has ensured that The Mummy retains immortality as a popular culture artefact.

Introduction

This introductory chapter provides an overview of The Mummy (1932). While the setting and concepts of The Mummy were relatively new to horror cinema as it existed in 1932, the film's creative team nonetheless had plenty of sources from which to take inspiration. Universal Pictures' previous horror films had generally taken place against a European backdrop informed by English Gothic and German Expressionism. The Mummy, on the other hand, turned to Egypt and its ancient history for inspiration. In doing so, the film hit upon what was, as far as cinema was concerned, a fresh variety of monster: a living mummy. Thanks to The Mummy, the cloth-wrapped Egyptian revenant would join the vampire, the werewolf, and Frankenstein's Monster as a horror icon, one that would appear in innumerable sequels, imitations, and parodies. The chapter then details the plot of The Mummy.

Literary Precursors

This chapter discusses the portrayal of mummies and ancient Egypt in fantastic literature. While not necessarily the basis of a coherent subgenre, mummies were a recurring theme in the supernatural literature of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries as authors of the fantastic found their imaginations fired by the latest developments in Egyptology. Stories from this period often differ significantly from the mummy films that would later develop in Hollywood, but certain aspects of them are nonetheless echoed by Universal Pictures' subgenre-defining 1932 film The Mummy. The chapter then describes haunted mummies and walking mummies. There are three writers in particular who stand out as the most likely influences upon Universal's The Mummy: Bram Stoker, Arthur Conan Doyle, and H. Rider Haggard.

The Legacy of The Mummy

This chapter highlights the legacy of The Mummy (1932). Ever since the 1930s, the plot elements and iconography of the film have been re-used, re-interpreted, and re-worked in myriad forms. Universal Pictures' follow-ups to The Mummy began eight years after the original film came out, by which time the studio's horror output had lost some of its spark from the early half of the 1930s. First came The Mummy's Hand in 1940, then The Mummy's Tomb in 1942 and The Mummy's Ghost and The Mummy's Curse in 1944. Eventually, Britain's Hammer Films obtained full remake rights to the Universal horror filmography. The chapter then looks at other mummy films made outside Universal and Hammer. In the era of franchise blockbusters, The Mummy remains a viable cinematic brand. While the original Universal Mummy series ended in 1955 and the Hammer revival in 1971, the 1990s saw Universal attempt to recreate The Mummy for a new generation.