Tom Cruise Wants To Show You The Mummy

So the big movie hitting this weekend is The Mummy, and this is Universal's attempt at launching their own universe of movies to rival stuff like Marvel and DC. But they don't have superheroes at their disposal, so they're dipping back into their archives and trying to bring back the classic Universal monsters of the 30s and 40s. Now The Mummy has already been rebooted once into the movies with Brendan Fraser, and those are fun enough. This time around, Universal is betting on huge star power, and they got Tom Cruise to play the lead, while Russell Crowe plays a huge supporting role as Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, who is kind of positioned as the Nick Fury of this universe. This seems like a case of Universal counting their universe chickens before they hatched, because THE MUMMY is getting pretty terrible reviews across the board. I'm hearing it represents the worst of modern blockbusters, nothing is scary, nothing is interesting, the movie stops dead to set up those future sequels, etc. Also, this just seems like a missed opportunity, but if you're going to cast Tom Cruise in your monster movie, how do you not call the movie SHOW ME THE MUMMY? Boggles the mind.

There is another movie out this weekend I am pretty excited about, and that's a new horror movie called It Comes at Night. This is a low-budget movie starring Joel Edgerton from the studio that made The Witch last year, which was excellent. And I genuinely don't know the plot of this movie, I've seen the the trailer a few times but it's much more built on atmosphere and creepy imagery, and all that looks great. And the reviews have been really strong, saying that that it might be too dark and grim for some viewers, but people who are into that kind of thing are going to love it.

Finally, I did want to mention Megan Leavey is out this weekend, which we've talked about on the show before because it's a true story based on a woman from right here in the Hudson Valley, which is pretty cool. Kate Mara plays a young marine and the movie centers on her bond with a military dog named Rex during their time in Iraq. I'm hearing pretty good things, and that the movie is a lot better than many people expected, and it's probably a must-watch for dog lovers out there.

So my recommendation is to go see It Comes at Night this weekend, but Megan Leavey isn't a bad alternative either. And until next time, we'll Meat at the Movies.

Bonus Video: Best of Boris & Robyn