The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor

Jet Li has risen from the dead and decided to take over the world. Fortunately, Rick O'Connell and his family are here to stop him. The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor is hampered by poorly shot action sequences, and while there is always something going on screen, you rarely come across a genuinely entertaining moment in the barrage of mediocre visual effects and toe-curling dialogue. This wannabe adventure film that masquerades as ideal family entertainment is actually a prime example of wasted potential. (29/07/2008)

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. (28/08/2009)

The unnecessarily long introduction, unraveling the legend around which the story revolves, merely plagiarizes the first installment and adequately foreshadows how the rest of the film will unfold. It’s boring and unnecessarily long. The film is visually interesting at times, but what's the use when the story is truly lacking in substance? This is not a nice return to old familiar characters. Plus, I really missed Rachel Weisz in this one. I have nothing against Maria Bello, but Rachel is my favorite. It's just an unbelievable rehash of previous installments, but now with an Asian twist... (01/04/2014)

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)

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)