The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor

Yuck. I love The Mummy, and The Mummy Returns is a great sequel. But this? Rob Cohen is not Stephen Sommers. Maria Bello is not Rachel Weisz. Jet Li is not Arnold Vosloo. Neither Brendan Fraser nor John Hannah do much in favor of the third Mummy. I liked a few, really only a few, scenes (the opening one, the yetis and part of the final "battle") but overall I was very disappointed. Thanks at least for the likeable duo of Michelle Yeoh and Isabella Leong. Thanks to Cohen, all the playfulness has gone out of The Mummy, leaving an uninspired 112-minute-long mess, which I hope has been so overused that no one will make a fourth film. Only Sommers, but I don't believe that.__P.S. Edelman's good music is a shame to waste on this one. (29/08/2009)

Colorful crap from time to time plays on an ambitious and visual effects-loaded note of a wannabe, failed blockbuster. All the atmosphere of the previous parts is gone and the watchable mix of action, romance, and adventure has been replaced by computer-generated avalanches, werewolves, the Terracotta Army, and the boring clown Jet Li. Those who expect an epic sequel will be disappointed. The wiscracks don't work, there is no story, and technically the worst by a long shot. Rob Cohen did exactly what was expected, he messed it up nicely. (28/11/2008)

Unnecessarily long introduction, where the legend is revealed, around which it will revolve, is just a plagiarism of the first part and quite sufficiently shows how the rest of the movie will proceed. Boring and unnecessarily long. The film is visually quite interesting at times, but what's the point when the story is really not worth anything? This is not a nice return to old familiar characters. Furthermore, I really missed Rachel Weisz here. I mean, no offense to Maria Bello, but Rachel is my favorite. Well, simply an incredible copycat of previous parts, only now it's Asian... (01/04/2014)

This is easy to predict and even easier to forget crap which at times is not even good enough for that one single use. Cohen is a purely action director, so it all comes down to overblown acrobatic escapades, which are ably followed by special effects, but their sterility knows no bounds. It lacks any ounce of perspective (and no, Liam Cunningham doesn't save it), and thus you're more likely to identify scenes stolen from elsewhere. I don't mind Maria Bello (I like her a lot as an actress), but as a replacement for Rachel Weisz, she was a total casting mistake. The family etudes are tired and the whole is desperately boring. (05/11/2010)

The third installment came like an uninvited poor relative you dislike even before they come knocking. However, while everyone expectedly wanted to kick it out, I found a way to it. And this despite my suffering from the loss of Rachel Weisz and therefore the inevitable transformation of Evelyn into a character who is neither a writer nor an adventurer, just a mandatory maternal element. With the change of director, it also lost a class of more childish humor, but I am still a viewer who hears, admires Brendan Fraser's adventurous position in big-budget archaeological trips, and holds my breath during the prologue, the car chase, or the avalanche. Although I was one of the worst prophets, I must now admit that I was surprisingly wrong. Shanghai and the Himalayas cannot replace Egypt and London, but still – I am grateful for my beloved series only dropping one class and not ending as deep as it could have under the hands of another team. (07/12/2008)