Lee Cronin's The Mummy (2026)
The Mummy is one of those properties that refuses to stay buried. From the Universal Monsters era of the 1930s through to the sun-baked, adventure-serial fun of the late 1990s and early 2000s, the franchise has proved remarkably elastic, bending itself to suit whatever the prevailing mood in popular cinema happens to be. The last serious attempt to resurrect it, the 2017 Tom Cruise vehicle that was supposed to launch Universal's ill-advised "Dark Universe" shared franchise, collapsed so spectacularly at the box office and with critics that it quietly shelved the whole concept. Nearly a decade on, it falls to Lee Cronin to have another go, though this time the approach is considerably less action-blockbuster and considerably more horror. The premise here is a long way from ancient curses and tomb raiders: a young girl vanishes without trace in the desert, and eight years later she is returned to her family, physically unaged and bearing something far worse than memories of wherever she has been. It is a grief-and-dread setup that owes more to folk horror and slow-burn psychological terror than to anything Boris Karloff ever did with bandages, and on paper at least it represents a genuine swing at reinvention.
Cronin arrives at this project with a tidy bit of genre credibility behind him. His feature debut, Evil Dead Rise (2023), was a Blumhouse and New Line co-production that managed the tricky business of extending a beloved and rather vicious franchise without embarrassing itself, earning broadly warm notices for its commitment to practical nastiness and its willingness to put women at the centre of the story. The same production partnership, with additional support from James Wan's Atomic Monster banner, is behind this picture, which suggests a certain confidence in Cronin's ability to deliver on-screen horror with some heft to it. At 133 minutes, the film is notably long for the genre, a creative choice that either signals ambition or a refusal to kill your darlings, depending on how generous you are feeling. The Irish-American co-production texture is interesting too, not entirely surprising given Cronin's own Dublin roots, a lineage shared, for what it is worth, with some of the more distinctive voices in recent Irish cinema (see, for instance, the quite different but equally atmosphere-heavy The Wind That Shakes the Barley (2006) for a sense of how Irish filmmaking can carry a particular weight of dread even outside the horror genre).
The cast is a polished but unremarkable gathering of familiar and rising faces. Jack Reynor, the Co. Wicklow-born actor who has carved out a solid niche in genre work following his memorable turn in Midsommar, takes the lead, and Laia Costa, the Spanish actress probably best known to British audiences from the relentless one-take experiment Victoria, plays opposite him as the journalist mother at the centre of the nightmare. May Calamawy, whose profile rose considerably after Moon Knight, rounds out the principal adult cast, while much of the film's emotional and physical horror rests on the younger shoulders of Natalie Grace and Shylo Molina, the latter playing the returned daughter Katie. Child performances in horror are notoriously difficult to pitch correctly, sitting as they do between naturalism and the kind of unsettling otherness the genre demands, and it is worth keeping that in mind when weighing up what you see on screen.
When it comes to The Mummy, I’ve seen just about every iteration under the sun. I’ve sat through the atmospheric original with Boris Karloff, cheered for Brendan Fraser’s brilliantly goofy adventures, and endured the ill-fated Tom Cruise reboot. Now, I’ve finally added Lee Cronin’s 2026 take to the list.
It’s undeniably one of the weaker entries in the franchise. But while it might not scale the dizzying, beloved heights of the Fraser era, there is still plenty to appreciate in Cronin’s bloody, ambitious swing at the mythos, even if it ultimately misses the mark.
I have to give fair play to Lee Cronin for daring to take a generationally known monster in a completely different, much darker direction. The foundational concept is a well-told story on paper, but the actual execution is an absolute narrative mess. The plot simply doesn't make sense at times, and the logical leaps are baffling. For instance, a small child goes missing for years, only to be found alive and well inside a sealed, ancient sarcophagus. And you’re genuinely expected to believe that the local authorities (and the ravenous world press) would just casually let her go home without asking a single, probing question? It’s genuinely laughable.
When it comes to the cast, the acting is decidedly average and, frankly, hammy as heck. The performances often feel like they're being delivered to the back row of a theatre rather than captured on an intimate film set. However, where the script and the actors stumble, the technical crew absolutely knocks it out of the park. The horror elements, the gruesome make-up, and the sheer visceral quality of the special effects are the undisputed standouts of the film. They are genuinely spectacular, and honestly, they are the only things saving this picture from being a total write-off.
Ultimately, Lee Cronin’s The Mummy is a deeply flawed, logically bankrupt, but visually spectacular piece of horror cinema. It’s a messy, over-the-top ride that relies far too heavily on its monstrous makeup to cover up its glaring narrative potholes. But if you can turn your brain off and just appreciate the sheer, gory craftsmanship on display, it’s still a highly watchable, below average slice of monster movie madness.
It might be one of the weaker Mummy films, but thanks to some truly stellar practical effects, it’s a fun, bloody mess that’s well worth a watch for the horror aficionados.
Whatever your tolerance for narrative looseness in horror, Lee Cronin's The Mummy is the sort of film that will generate genuinely divided opinions, which is perhaps not the worst thing that can be said about a studio monster movie in 2026. Fans of effects-driven, go-for-broke practical horror, the kind who found plenty to enjoy in the more relentless passages of Evil Dead Rise, may well find the craft on display here more than enough to hold their attention across that generous runtime. Those hoping for something as tightly constructed as the best entries in the franchise are likely to find it a frustrating experience. It is a film that seems to trust its makeup department considerably more than its script department, and the gap between those two things is, by all accounts, fairly wide. The Mummy has survived worse reinventions, of course, and it will probably survive this one too. Whether that is a comfort or a warning rather depends on where you stand.
Rating: ★★ | Year: 2026 | Watched: 2026-07-06
Trailer
▶ Watch the official trailer for Lee Cronin's The Mummy (2026) on YouTube
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