Monday, September 21, 2015

#42Movies, Day 11: Egregious Egyptology

"You call this archaeology?"

Stargate (1994)
and
The Mummy (1999)

We'll dig into it after the trailers.*


https://youtu.be/kiJtZUPvJxY


https://youtu.be/h3ptPtxWJRs

I saw an advance screening of Stargate at the Aquarius Theatre in Palo Alto. It was some kind of American Express** members-only promotional thing. I remember the crowd responding mostly favorably, but as we all know, the best thing about that movie is that it begat the Stargate television universe. But that's another story.

The 1999 Mummy film started as a remake/reboot of the 1932 Universal picture starring horror icon Boris Karloff, but somewhere along the way transmuted into something a lot more fun. And yes, many elements in its portrayal of modern Egypt remain problematic, but the movie's success also made possible a sequel in which Rachel Weisz's character actually gets to kick some ass. And it introduced Oded Fehr to the world, so we'll call that a net positive.



* SOMEBODY STOP ME

** I got an American Express BLUE card when it first became available, mostly because it was the only AMEX card available without an annual fee. The card originally had an embedded smart-chip and came with a USB reader device for secure online shopping (which was an all-around FAIL: I could never actually get the reader to work AND I'M A COMPUTER SCIENTIST). A few years later, AMEX removed the chip from their Blue cards. I wonder if they'll put it back now that everyone's moving to EMV...


Curtis

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