The Movie: The Mummy is a campy, half comedy, half adventure flick that doesn't take itself too seriously, yet thoroughly entertains. Some greedy explorers inadvertently set off a 3,000 year old curse that threatens to destroy the world, and now they have to stop these ancient forces of evil. Ok, so the plot isn't very engaging, but there's just enough of it to keep you interested in what happens in between the little bits of comedy and the amazing special effects.

Don't look for any deep intellectual stimulation here -- The Mummy may stimulate your senses, but not your mind. So check your brain at the door, but get ready for a fun ride!

The DVD: This disc featured a wonderfully rich, full and sharp video transfer, with virtually no grain, and very little dust or dirt visible. The 5.1 surround audio, though full of great ambient surround sound, didn't have quite the level of surround sound tricks that you'd expect from a movie like this, but was otherwise pretty good. There are a bunch of special features, including a commentary track, a documentary, deleted scenes, theatrical trailers, production notes, cast/crew bios, and a collection of factoids on ancient Egypt. There's also some DVD-ROM stuff on there.

The Widescreen Collector's Edition (which I have reviewed here) is apparently only one of a number of versions of this film available on DVD. There is also a pan-and-scan version of the Collector's Edition, as well as the "Ultimate Edition", which as far as I can tell seems to be a 2 disc set that includes both pan and scan and anamorphic widescreen versions, but seems to have the same set of special features. I have not confirmed this, however.