Lee Cronin's The Mummy (2026) Review
Lee Cronin's The Mummy goes hard and certainly works in parts, but never really comes together as a whole.
Lee Cronin’s The Mummy goes straight for the throat and keeps going, but it never really finds another gear.
Plot
The young daughter of a journalist disappears into the desert without a trace. Eight years later, the broken family is shocked when she’s returned to them. However, what should be a joyful reunion soon turns into a living nightmare as she starts to transform into something truly horrifying.
Good Points
Goes hard on gore and doesn’t hold back
Practical effects are nasty and impressive
Fully commits to its uncomfortable tone
The investigation subplot added some needed structure
Strong visuals in certain scenes
Bad Points
Relies too much on shock
Tone swings between serious and ridiculous
Weak emotional core despite the heavy themes
A bit repetitive
The pacing
My Thoughts on Lee Cronin’s The Mummy
It goes hard - but doesn’t build
The first thing that I will say, is how far it pushes the gore - it’s aggressive, messy, and very in-your-face with it - and to be fair, some of it lands very very well, as there are moments where it genuinely gets a reaction - you know, that full-body “nope” response.
But the problem is, it leans on that constantly, so after a while, it stops escalating and just repeats - bigger, louder, nastier - but it isn’t really more effective, and instead of building much, it just throws yet more of the same at you.
It’s like the film thinks turning everything up will create the momentum needed to keep it going, and spoiler alert, it doesn’t, although we do have some brief stretches where everything lines up and you can see what it’s aiming for, but, unfortunately, it never holds onto that rhythm long enough to actually matter.
It’s not really a Mummy movie
This being a Mummy film barely registers, as strip that away and nothing really changes - there’s no real interest in mythology, no deeper exploration of the concept - so it leans almost entirely into possession horror instead.
And it doesn’t do much new or fresh either, as it just pulls from familiar territory without adding much else where it feels like it’s chasing the energy of better films without understanding why they worked in the first place, with a clear attempt to hit that frantic, high-energy horror style, but those better films had control underneath it all - this doesn’t.
The tone can’t decide what it is
The tone is also a bit messy and inconsistent as well - one minute it’s dealing with grief and family trauma, while the next, it’s throwing something so over-the-top it feels random, and that clash really undercutted everything.
But very now and then, the film slows down enough just enough to hint at something better, but they scenes never get the space they need, as they’re quickly drowned out by another wave of gore or mayhem, like the film doesn’t trust anything that isn’t loud or in your face.
While the loudness works in parts, I expected more from this type of film, too, but maybe that’s on me.
The ‘focus’
The performances are solid enough, but the writing doesn’t give them much though, and where the family dynamic is supposed to be the emotional core, none of it really fully connects - you understand the intention, but you don’t feel it, and characters come and go in odd ways.
Threads get introduced and then dropped, people disappear for stretches, and it starts raising questions that end up pulling you out of the film, and it just feels a bit too unfocused.
But the investigation subplot is surprisingly the most engaging part, because it has direction, purpose, and doesn’t rely entirely on shock to keep things moving, which makes it stand out for the wrong reasons.
It feels like the version of the film that might have worked better if that had been the focus.
It looks great when it wants to
Visually, there are moments that are great, with some of the practical effects being genuinely impressive, and there are sequences where the direction feels sharp and controlled - you can see the talent behind it, but it just gets buried under everything else, and the pacing doesn’t help either.
It drags in places where it should tighten, then rushes through things that might have mattered, so by the final stretch, it felt like it should go all in, but it oddly pulls back, which didn’t fit with how extreme everything else has been.
I am not sure it really earns that 133 minutes runtime.
Final Verdict
Very mixed feelings, but I was overall disappointed by the film and how it went, but if you just want some gore and some scenes that go hard, I am sure you will have fun with it, and in parts, I did.
But I expected a bit more from it.
Trailer
Directed by - Lee Cronin
Written by - Lee Cronin
Cast - Jack Reynor, Laia Costa, May Calamawy, Natalie Grace, and Verónica Falcón
Cinematography - Dave Garbett
Running time - 133 minutes
Great review.