This Movie Can Only Be Described With One Word.

Some things I liked some I did not.

There are moments that feel comical, some horrific, and some downright inspiring but the tonal shifts hardly matter as the end results come to a film that's perfect for this time.

One of the best movies of the year! Incredible from the beginning to the end.

An endearingly trashy low-budgeter which betrays a great deal of inspiration stemming from Fulci's ZOMBIE FLESH EATERS. You see, this isn't your run-of-the-mill strangling mummy milarky, this is your fully-fledged gut-munching stomach churner in the style of the Italian zombie and cannibal wave of the late '70s/early '80s. At least, it is in the last half hour, and unfortunately due to some incredibly poor pacing, not a lot happens for the first hour. Is the graphic finale worth waiting for? I think so, but impatient viewers might not agree. This is a film for bad movie lovers only, who enjoy over-the-top cheesy music, appalling acting and cheap gore effects which aren't going to give you any sleepless nights.How's this for an international production? It's an American movie, financed by Italians, and shot in Cairo by an Egyptian director! Even with all this multi-cultural talent it's a shame they couldn't make a wholly decent movie, instead one that must be enjoyed for all the wrong reasons. The entire cast can't act, from the Egyptian extras to the dumb fashion models (their grating characters do things like wander through the scrub land at night). Especially bad is Rick, the blond-haired tomb defiler who goes all hysterical and intense towards the end. Behind the camera, the talent ain't so great either, and director Frank Agrama's only other movie of note is the equally shoddy QUEEN KONG. That comes as little surprise.After the numbing 'flashback' which predictably opens the movie, we're treated to lots of wandering about in cheap sets before the horror really begins. Aside from a brief entrail-pulling and some extras getting their faces melted due to poison in the air, not a lot happens in the first fifty minutes or so. There's lots of murky photography in the tombs, some of which is atmospheric, the rest boring. One thing that Agrama does do correctly is offer repeated quick shots of the mummy to build up the tension, as you just know that it's going to awake shortly. The scientific explanation is that heat from the lights used for the fashion shoot causes the embalming fluid inside the mummy to melt (lots of gooey close-ups of course), thus returning it to life. As well as this, the mummy's poorly-dressed followers - apparently buried only a couple of feet below the sand outside, despite lying there for thousands of years - return to life with a taste for human flesh. Agrama achieves one good scare - the mummy sitting bolt upright in its tomb all of a sudden - which managed to make me jolt in surprise.Make-up wise, the thin leading mummy looks very much like Christopher Lee in Hammer's THE MUMMY, which is no bad thing at all. Its minions are more typical decaying zombie types, once again the slimy makeup resembling De Rossi's work in ZOMBIE FLESH EATERS. The gore effects are cheap but plentiful, and whilst not always convincing or as 'hard' as you might believe, they're certainly good value for what little money Agrama and his crew had. Cleavers go into skulls, heads are chopped off, throats are torn out and finally the intestine-ripping gut-munching begins, again including a rip-off of ZOMBIE FLESH EATERS in a scene in which a bride is discovered as the main course for the zombies. A scene at the film's finale, in which a town square in Cairo is the setting for a massacre as the zombies jump on their prey, is absolutely hilarious and over-the-top and a lot of fun. The abrupt ending with-a-twist is a disappointment but I can live with that. DAWN OF THE MUMMY: a treat for bad movie lovers, but beware discerning viewers.

An attempt to merge mummy movies and living dead zombies into a gore/bore fest. The acting is just awful, with hardly a shred of unchewed scenery by the end. For instance, one of the leading ladies finds a severed head in the desert, and begins to screetch and whoop while running in a circle around the head (as opposed to running away from it) until she finally launches herself at one of the guys and slides down his body like a cheap party dress. The story and effects are pretty threadbare. The wacky gang of thieves keeps talking insanely about the gold they are looking for until they finally pull out two or three small gilded thingies from the mummy's body. The thieves are so thrilled to find three little pieces of gold they whoop, they beat the lid, they dance, they laugh. Oh yeah, they're in the money now. Why, those three little pieces of gold might bring as much as $50! Good times, good times… The mummy itself is kind of gooey, and doesn't seem to eat much flesh, but as legend would have it, when the mummy arose, his buried minions also arose. The minions were not in the tomb however—they apparently spent the last 3,000 years buried in 3 inches of sand. Once they sit up, they immediately shamble around like extras from one of the Living Dead movies. Are they mummies? Zombies? Mumbies? Pretty soon, things finally get icky. Classic scenarios abound, like opening the door to the room where a bride is getting ready for her wedding and finding three or four mumbies chowing down on her. Finally, a building burns, a group of bad actors limp away, and a cloth-covered hand rises in the foreground. The end?

Some fashion models and their photographers decide to shoot a fashion spread in Egypt for the fashion magazine.At the same time,three bandits are excavating the burial site of the Mummy, who was introduced during the film's opening.The two groups cross paths and the fashion photographer decides that the Mummy's tomb would make a really great backdrop.Unbeknowst for them the place is cursed and the ten foot Mummy comes back to life,bringing an army of zombies with him.A flesh-eating rampage ensues!But before that occurs,an hour of film passes by and actors act very badly.Frank Agrama's "Dawn of the Mummy" is often regarded as the goriest mummy flick ever made.It is surely loaded with lots of gore and gut munching,especially during its last 30 minutes,so fans of splatter should be pleased.Still the action is rather dull and the film offers nothing fresh or new.However if you are a gore-hound you may give it a try.7 out of 10.

Believe it or not but, strictly seen from a marketing-point-of-view, this "Dawn of the Mummy" actually is a rather clever movie! The DVD-cover just screams out "the first mummy gore movie ever!" (at least, mine does) and even the title is clearly inspired by the 1978 cult-hit. It's obvious that the makers carefully observed the zombie-gore successes of both George A. Romero and Lucio Fulci and they wanted to do exactly the same…only with mummies! You can't really blame anyone for exploiting something that's profitable, right? The movie itself, however, is every bit as bad as you expect it to be: no plot, few tension, unlikable characters, laughable dialogues and – of course – atrocious 80's acting. It's about a couple of greedy treasure-hunters, dressed up like archaeologists, who perpetrate an ancient Egyptian pyramid in search of gold. All of a sudden, a group of young and idiotic fashion models and photographers join in and their noise and heavy lighting equipment cause the mummy to awake. Irritated as he is, the mummy and his servants go on a killing spree. The first hour of this film is tame, incredibly sophomoric and hardly endurable because of its cheapness. There are a few lame attempts to throw in some sleaze (because it sells, I guess) and eerie music but nothing helps. If you are a persistent horror fan and make it to the last 20 minutes, you'll be rewarded with an explosively gore climax in which nearly all the irritating characters you hated so much will die a violent and nasty death! Amen for that! Other mildly entertaining elements include an atmospheric resurrection of desert-zombies (shamelessly copied from Fulci's repertoire, but still…) and the (stereotypical) old witch who wanders around nagging about the curse! Unless you want to see every horror movie made, I'd advise you to skip "Dawn of the Mummy" as it is almost too stupid for words. For example: this movie teaches us that mummies can be brought to life rather easily! You don't need no complex hieroglyphs or boring parchments…all you got to do is hatch the mummy out!