New 'Mummy' opens Friday, but no wrap yet on old 'Mummy'

Boris Karloff as Ardath Bey, the Mummy in human form.

From a whisper to a scream: The most famous sequence in the 1932 version of “The Mummy” — resurrected in a two-disc “Special Edition” DVD this month, to coincide with Friday’s release of the big-budget adventure epic “The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor” — begins with almost inaudible mumbling and ends with a shriek of terror.

Barely moving his lips, a young archeologist (Bramwell Fletcher) in a camp in the Egyptian desert reads the words on the Scroll of Thoth that bring life to the 3,700-year-old thing in the sarcophagus behind him.

Boris Karloff and Zita Johann in "The Mummy".

Boris Karloff as Ardath Bey, the Mummy in human form.

When the archeologist sees the risen Imhotep (Boris Karloff), he screams — and then begins to laugh, maniacally. “He went for a little walk,” he tells his colleagues. “You should have seen his face!”

Although we, the viewers of the movie, are “present” when the mummy returns to life, we see much less than the young archeologist. Jack Pierce, Universal’s resident genius makeup artist, reportedly spent hours wrapping Karloff in gauze and caking him in clay, but director Karl Freund mostly hides from our eyes what would become one of the most famous icons in motion pictures (thanks to still pictures of Karloff in the mummy makeup, and to the walking mummies that would dominate the movie’s four sequels).

We see the mummy’s eyelids part, as slow as eternity; we see a stiff, wrinkled hand begin to drop and, later, reach for the scroll; we see a trail of bandages slide through a doorway, apparently unraveling from the mummy’s legs as the creature makes its exit. But we never see the mummy walking, we never see its full, revenant form. Freund — the celebrated photographer of such classics as “The Last Laugh” (1924), “Metropolis” (1927) and “Dracula” (1931), here making his directorial debut — relies on suggestion; he requires us to use our imagination.

The sequence epitomizes the movie’s stealth approach to horror. “The Mummy” is as quiet and patient as its title character, who reappears sans bandages as a wizened Egyptian in a fez and a frock who calls himself “Ardath Bey” (still Karloff, of course).

Ardath Bey holds himself stiffly erect, never raises his lisping voice, and moves as little as possible, as if to preserve his physical strength. “I dislike to be touched — an Eastern prejudice,” he says, but we suspect if he allowed himself to be clapped on the back he might crumble to dust. Karloff’s reserve, his stillness, is impressive; for the first time, Universal billed him in ads as “Karloff the Uncanny,” and the unusual adjective was a perfect fit.

“The Mummy” has been issued on DVD twice before. This new “Special Edition” from Universal Studios Home Entertainment mixes old and new bonus features. The package includes two commentary tracks and three documentaries, including Kevin Brownlow’s much-recycled 95-minute “Universal Horror,” and documentaries about the Universal Mummy movies and makeup artist Jack Pierce.

For those who prefer athletic if decomposing CGI mummies that can outrun double-decker buses, crawl up walls like spiders and eject plagues of flies from their mouths, Universal this month also has issued two-disc “Deluxe” and Blu-ray editions of the Brendan Fraser films that preceded “The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor.” These movies — closer in spirit to Indiana Jones than Boris Karloff — include “The Mummy” (1999) and “The Mummy Returns” (2001).

— For more on “The Mummy,” visit John Beifuss’ blog, thebloodshoteye.com.

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