The Mummy sent it into the stratosphere.Ĭoming across as effortlessly funny, and winning over audiences quickly, it was inevitable that he’d be signed up for the sequel to The Mummy. He’d also appeared in the acclaimed Gods And Monsters too, and his star was on the rise at speed.
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Fraser broke through as a movie star in the late 90s, headlining hits George Of The Jungle and Blast From The Past (both excellent).
A chunk of the credit for that surely lies at the door of its leading man, and his rapport with the also-terrific Rachel Weisz. The 1999 take on The Mummy (above) is a bit of a baggy beast, but it’s also bursting with entertainment, and huge amounts of fun. Where had the fun gone? Why was Cruise – a very able actor, of course – struggling to headline a movie with anywhere near the level of charm that Fraser had managed?
But for someone growing up on the blockbuster movies of the 80s and 90s, I felt I wasn’t alone in wondering: why didn’t they just get Brendan Fraser back? Appreciating the story of The Mummy has been told numerous times on the big screen, the attempt to gamble on a fresh reboot headlined by Tom Cruise may have looked good on paper. Sitting through the pretty joyless, Dark Universe-branded reboot of The Mummy back in 2017, pretty much most of us were sat there thinking that this was not a very good film. When The Mummy: Tomb Of The Dragon Emperor was released, there were plans for at least one more Mummy movie with Brendan Fraser – but it didn’t go to plan.