The Mummy is a 1932 horror film directed by Karl Freund. The film stars Boris Karloff, Zita Johann, and David Manners, and it is part of the “Universal Monsters” line of films.
Director: Karl Freund
Production Company: Universal Pictures
Distributor: Universal Pictures
Cast: Boris Karloff, Zita Johann, David Manners, Edward van Sloan, Arthur Byron
US Box Office: $925,000 ($38,500,000 adjusted for inflation)
Film Format: Black & White
Genre: Horror
Release Date: December 22, 1932
Plot Summary: In 1921, Norton (Bramwall Fletcher), the assistant of Egyptian archeologist Sir Joseph Whemple (Arthur Byron) accidently resurrects the ancient mummy Imhotep after reading a scroll. Eleven years later Sir Joseph, his son Frank (David Manners), and Dr. Muller (Edward Van Sloan) find the tomb of Imhotep’s lover Anck-es-en-Amon thanks to the help of a mysterious Egyptian man named Ardath Bey (Boris Karloff). Little do they know that Bey is actually the mummy Imhotep, and that he is stalking Helen Grosvenor (Zita Johann) because he believes she is the reincarnation of his lost love!
Production: Following the release of the successful Dracula (1931) and Frankenstein (1931), Universal producer Carl Laemmle Jr. began looking for a new novel that he could adapt into an Egyptian-themed horror film. Laemmle was fascinated by the discovery and opening of ancient Egyptian Pharaoh Tutankhamun’s tomb in 1922, and thought that the Ancient Egyptian premise would make for a good horror film. Laemmle commissioned story editor Richard Schayer to find an Egyptian-themed novel to adapt. Schayer was not able to find an acceptable novel, so he and Nina Wilcox Putnam wrote a nine page story treatment called Cagliostro, about a 3,000 year old occultist in modern San Francisco, to serve as a premise for the Egyptian horror film. Laemmle liked the concept, and he hired John L. Balderston to add Egyptian elements and write the script for the film. Balderston had covered the opening of Tutankhamun’s tomb for the New York World as a journalist, so he was familiar with ancient Egyptian mythology. Balderston set the film in Egypt, made the made villain an ancient Egyptian Mummy, created the “Scroll of Thoth”, and added the concepts of resurrection and reincarnation to the script. Balderston’s original script was given the working titles of Imhotep and The King of the Dead.
Laemmle hired Karl Freund to direct the Egyptian-themed horror film which was soon retitled The Mummy. Freund, a German immigrant, had previously been the cinematographer on Dracula. The Mummy was the first American film that Freund directed. Laemmle chose Boris Karloff for the role of Imhotep the mummy. Karloff had been working as an actor for many years, but quickly became a star following the release of Frankenstein, in which he played Frankenstein’s Monster. Freund cast actress Zita Johann in the roles of Helen Grosvenor and Imhotep’s lover Anck-es-en-Amon, named after the real life wife of Tutankhamun. David Manners (Frank Whemple) and Edward Van Sloan (Dr. Muller) had previously appeared together in Dracula, Van Sloan also previously appeared with Karloff in Frankenstein.
Boris Karloff’s makeup for Imhotep was designed and applied by Universal makeup artist Jack Pierce, who studied photos of mummy Seti I to get the right look for Imhotep. Pierce had previously done the makeup for Karloff in Frankenstein. The makeup process used to create Imhotep as a bandaged mummy at the start of the film took eight hours to apply (and two hours to remove). Pierce would apply layers of cotton, spirit gum, and greasepaint to Karloff’s face, plaster clay over Karloff’s hair, wrap him in treated gauze, and bake everything under a heat lamp so it looked ragged and decayed. The makeup used for Karloff as Imhotep’s Ardath Bey disguise only took about four hours to apply, and used thinner layers of cotton and spirit gum. Although some of the Universal actors that worked with Pierce hated him, Karloff got along very well with Pierce, and the two collaborated together on some aspects of the design process.
Filming on The Mummy began in September of 1932, and was scheduled to last about three weeks. Most of the interior scenes in the film were shot on set at Universal Studios in California. The scenes set at the tomb excavation site and the flashback scene in Ancient Egypt were filmed on location in the Mojave Desert, the Red Rock Canyon State Park in Cantil, and at the Rocky Buttes in Palmdale. Some additional deleted scenes were shot at Blaney Ranch in Palmdale, and Vasquez Rocks. Director Karl Freund did not get along well with Zita Johann. He was frequently rude and antagonistic towards her on set.
Fun Facts and Trivia: The opening credits of The Mummy features a song from Pyotr Tchaikovsky’s ballet Swan Lake. That same song was also used in the opening credits of Dracula. The Mummy’s Hand (1940) and several of the other follow up films to The Mummy reuse archive footage of Karloff as a young Imhotep in the flashback scene to explain the background of the mummy character in those films. This is strange because neither Karloff nor the character Imhotep appear in those films. The later Mummy films instead feature a different mummy named Kharis who was played by Tom Tyler and later Lon Chaney Jr. The statue of Isis that appeared in The Mummy was later reused in Universal’s Flash Gordon (1936) serial.
Henry Victor is credited as a character named “The Saxon Warrior,” but his scenes were cut from the finished film. The Mummy originally contained a longer version of the flashback sequence that showed several of Helen’s past lives from Ancient Egypt to the present. Victor’s character would have appeared in this segment. Karl Freund cut the scene due to time constraints, much to the disappointment of actress Zita Johann, who liked the scene and believed in the concept of reincarnation.
Reception: The Mummy was released on December 22, 1932 in the United States. The film was not as successful as Dracula or Frankenstein had been, though it was able to earn a small profit for Universal due to its low budget. Unlike many of the other Universal Monsters films, The Mummy did not receive a direct sequel, rather it received a loose remake called The Mummy’s Hand (1940). That film featured a mummy named Kharis (Tom Tyler) instead of Imhotep. The Mummy’s Hand received three sequels where Lon Chaney Jr. took over the role of Kharis. As with many of the other Universal Monsters films, The Mummy was rediscovered by a new generation in the 1950s and 1960s due to being shown on television and screened at drive-in movie theaters.
The Mummy received mixed reviews from critics when it was first released. The staff at the Sydney Morning Herald gave the film a negative review. They thought that The Mummy‘s premise (an ancient dead person coming back to life in the present day) was interesting, but that the film squandered this by being too melodramatic. The staff at TIME magazine similarly criticized the film for having an “unreasonable” plot. Andre Sennwald of The New York Times also gave The Mummy a negative review, he thought that the cinematography was good, but that the dialogue was bad. Martin Dickstein of the Brooklyn Daily Eagle thought that the make up was not as good as the makeup used in Frankenstein, and that Dracula had a better plot. The critics at Variety gave The Mummy a positive review. They described Imhotep’s resurrection at the start of the film as being the “highlight.” Josephine O’Neill of the Daily Telegraph praised The Mummy for its set design. The Mercury and Photoplay both praised the film’s makeup and Karloff’s performance. P.S. Harrison of Harrison’s Reports also gave The Mummy a positive review, he thought that it was well-made, but noted that audiences would only like it if they enjoyed horror films.
In modern times, The Mummy has received a more positive reaction from film critics, with many regarding it as a classic in the horror genre. David Parkinson of Empire praised Boris Karloff’s performance in the film. He thought that Karloff’s ability to communicate well (despite wearing heavy makeup) added much more emotion to the character. Dave Kehr of the Chicago Reader thought that the dialogue was weak but that Freund’s use of lighting in The Mummy was brilliant. Bob Blum of Journal and Currier praised Karloff’s performance and described the film as a “true horror masterpiece.” In 2001, The Mummy was one of 400 films nominated by the American Film Institute for its list of the top 100 most thrilling American films.
Why You Should See It: The Mummy is a mostly good horror film. Direct Karl Freund’s lighting and cinematography is fantastic and gives the film a very creepy atmosphere. Boris Karloff gives a good performance as Imhotep, he is menacing, but also sympathetic at times. Karloff’s voice is perfect for the part and adds an otherworldly aspect to the character. Jack Pierce’s makeup work on Karloff is also fantastic. As an early sound film, The Mummy does have some strange dialogue and awkward character interactions, but its not as pronounced here as it was in Dracula or Frankenstein.