Warner Bros. Pictures presents Lee Cronin’s The Mummy in UK cinemas from April 17, 2026.
Synopsis
The young daughter of a journalist disappears into the desert without a trace—eight years later, the broken family is shocked when she is returned to them, as what should be a joyful reunion turns into a living nightmare.
Review
The Mummy is a name and a franchise now synonymous with horror. After almost 100 years and now 15 movies featuring a variation of the name in the title it conjures a very strong set of expectations from the audience. But that 15th film, Lee Cronin’s The Mummy releasing this week in UK cinemas, beyond destroys the rule book. Taking the writer/director’s unique sense of horror and twisting The Mummy into something almost unrecognisable.
The premise is surprisingly simple. Journalist Charlie Cannon (Charlie Cannon) and his wife Larissa (Laia Costa), a nurse, live in Cairo where he is on assignment. They have two completely typical children: Katie (Emily Mitchell and later Natalie Grace) and Seb (Dean Allen Williams and later Shylo Molina) whilst Larissa is pregnant with a third child. One day Katie is playing at the end of the garden when a mysterious woman (Hayat Kamille) claiming to be the mother of her friend Layle (Aisha Laouini and later May Elghety) arrives and uses magic to kidnap her.
Eight years later, now with youngest child Maud (Billie Roy), the family lives in Albuquerque where Charlie has moved to work behind-the-scenes. The family struggles on despite never learning Katie’s fate until one day a call comes in to say she has been found. Only problem is that she was found mummified in a 3,000 year-old sarcophagus. From there let’s just say that chaos ensues…
There’s a lot to enjoy about Cronin’s approach to the film. Fans of Evil Dead Rise will instantly recognise his approach to both story and horror. This film isn’t simply built on jump scares. There’s plenty of body horror, splatter, supernatural elements and even folk horror in how it ties back to Egyptian mythology. Cronin’s scattergun approach works tirelessly to create an unpredictable set of scares for the audience. But that experience is letdown somewhat by muddled plotting.
Clocking in at an already lengthy 132 minutes the film feels as if certain chunks have been taken out in order to speed things up. So key moments such as Katie tormenting Maud suddenly shift to the younger sibling in school. Are we to presume she didn’t want to tell her parents about the traumatising experience of her older, mummified sister licking her toes and controlling her to levitate under duress? Then there are oddities like the rotting piece of floor in Katies room. Entirely unexplained but useful for allowing her free movement when there are now bolts and padlocks on her door. These moments are never able to completely distract from the experience. But they do linger enough in the mind to creep in on reflection.
The Mummy classically these with the idea of eternal love, and the mysticism of the ancient Egyptians alongside notions of reincarnation. If we look to the 90’s action-adventure films those themes still exist as does the central figure of Imhotep and his lover Ankh-es-en-amon. None of that is present in Cronin’s version essentially making this an Evil Dead film with an Egyptian fascination. Cronin instead builds his story around the theme of family, which does have aspects of eternal love, but chooses to frame it through duty and the threat of destruction at the hands of the demonic presence possessing Katie. This is what’s most bewildering about the film, apart from a final scene clearly tacked on during reshoots. Its horror elements are faultless and all gel neatly into an incredibly visceral cinema experience. But it’s not The Mummy. I can’t help but feel the title does the film a huge disservice.
In stark contrast to that disservice is Natalie Grace as the older Katie. Grace has a bright future ahead in horror based on this performance. It’s guttural, animalistic and at times genuinely stomach churning. Despite very few lines of dialogue Grace is able to communicate a huge amount purely through movement, grunts and screams. Her physicality is monumental in making The Mummy an unforgettable cinematic experience. All of the kids in the film do a great job of selling the premise just as way the case in Evil Dead Rise. Cronin knows how to cast these roles well and get the performance he needs from them.
Jack Reynor and Laia Costa do a lot of heavy lifting alongside Verónica Falcón as Carmen Santiago, Larissa’s mother, and May Calamawy as Dalia Zaki, the detective who investigates Katie’s reappearance. All four feel a little at the behest of the plot as though they are simply caught up in the wake of an Egyptian sandstorm. But their sheer terror in reaction to unfolding events strong sells exactly what Cronin is trying to get his audience to buy into.
Verdict
Enthusiastically disturbing and blood-spattered, Lee Cronin’s The Mummy is an effective if not completely successful attempt to do something fresh with the near-century-old story. Thanks to its visceral sequences of horror and great young cast the film is a certified must watch for horror fans.
⭐⭐⭐.5
