"Come in with me and we will open this great find together"
Sir Joseph Whemple to Dr Muller in Universal Studio's 1932 The Mummy
A Little Mummy History Lesson
I have a soft spot the orginal 1932 black and white Boris Karloff film which eventually got remade as the film we all know and love. Although the story is somewhat different (I will explain this in more detail later) it has a diginity which has kept it fresh and interesting even to us nearly seventy years later and this is probably this which nudged Steven Sommers towards the idea.
While the story although simpler and with less of a convaluted plot it is still as mysterious and compelling to us in the new Millennium as it was when it was first made. It also stands up well against the remake if you realise the P's and Q's the film makers of those times had to mind. No Imhotep striding across the dunes in little more than a loin cloth - it just wasn't done they had to be fully clothed , no half regenerated mummy's bursting into a lady's bedroom - that would have given the 1930s ladies apoplexy, and the hero was a rather wishy washy British type too but they can be forgiven for that.
So if you haven't seen it go and see and if you can get a copy, if you have read on and see whether my ideas and comments spark anything in your mind. I'd love to hear from you and see what your response is..
The so what happened in the 1932 Mummy?
British Museum Field Expedition 1922
Deep in the desert in Egypt Expedition of Archelogists lead by Sir Joseph Whemple (David Manners) is cataloguing its recent finds. One of these is a strange box and the other is an even stranger looking mummy which is causing much interest.
On studying the body the team decipher the heiroglyphs in the coffin and read the body of Imhotep, High Priest of the Temple of the Sun at Karnak. It seems, says Dr Muller (Edward Von Sloan), from the state of the muscles under the bandages that he was buried alive.
The box which was found with him is more curious. When the plain wooden covering is opened another golden box is found inside with a terrible curse written upon on it. 'Death, eternal punishment for anyone who opens this casket in the name of Amen-Ra King of the gods' Inside this casket is a scroll which Whemple recognises as the Scroll of Thoth which Isis used to bring Osiris back from the dead.
Dr Muller takes Whemple outside to warn him about what the Scroll may cause if it is read but of course all is too late. One of the young members of the team Ralph Norton (Bramwell Fletcher) has already done this and he goes hysterical when the mummy wakes up and walks off taking the scroll with him. We are told that poor Ralph died laughing in a straight jacket, but them the sight of the bandages trailing behind the revived mummy through the dust may well have been enough to do that to him.
British Field Expedition 1932
We jump forward ten years and find that although Sir Joseph gave up his archeologcal work after the strange occurance all those years ago his son Frank is now carrying it on. This time they have been less successful however and seem to be destined to go home empty handed until a stranger - he introduces himself as Adath Bey - turns up telling them he knows where the tomb of Ankh-en-es-amen the daughter of Amenophis the Magnificent is buried. He is proved right too when the digging is done, although the finds have to go to the Cairo Museum and not to the British Museum in London as it was an Egyptian who originally pointed out where they were found. Most of the circumstances filmed about the finding are a replay of the finding of King Tut's tomb if you know your history. The complete tomb and it's mummy are claimed to be the greatest find since Tut-ankh-amen and the story of Anlh-es-en-amen fills all the front pages of the newspapers all over the world.
Continued on the next page ....
