The Mummy’s Revenge: A Monstrous Collection

You can get a head start on dear old Mummy’s Day with MCA/Universal’s latest dip into its horror-film vaults: “The Mummy Collection” ($100). The four-film set unearths the 1940s’ “Mummy” series that proved to be among the studio’s favorite monsters: “The Mummy’s Hand,” “The Mummy’s Ghost,” “The Mummy’s Tomb” and “The Mummy’s Curse.”

The films were all low-budget quickies made between 1940 and 1944. (The original 1932 “The Mummy,” starring Boris Karloff, which set the standard, is also available separately on laser from MCA, at $35.)

The new three-disc collection comes complete with a six-page full-color brochure that includes informative liner notes on each film, plus chapter stops. Supplemental material--theatrical trailers and production stills--come at the end of Sides 3 and 6, each covering the two films preceding them.

The “Mummy” films unwrap sequentially, beginning with the best of the four, “The Mummy’s Hand,” from 1940, shot in two weeks for $80,000, directed by Christy Cabanne and written by Griffin Jay and Maxwell Shane. The film stars cowboy Tom Tyler and features George Zucco as the High Priest.

“The Mummy’s Tomb” (1942) introduces Lon Chaney Jr. as the monster and co-stars Elyse Knox. “The Scarlet Pimpernel’s” Harold Young directs. Chaney reports that he “didn’t like the part at all. There wasn’t anything you could do with the Mummy. You just got into the makeup and bandages and walked around dragging your leg.” Looking at these films, you have to agree with him.

Good contract player that he was, Chaney dragged his leg around again in 1944’s “The Mummy’s Ghost.” Arguably the least of the series, it features an over-the-top John Carradine, which director Reginald LeBorg says he allowed because “Carradine’s voice was sonorous and excellent, much better than the average actor’s, so I let him go on. In a picture like that, you can be a little hammy.”

“The Mummy’s Curse,” also released in 1944, was the last chapter in the series, once more featuring Chaney, this time with Virginia Christine (later finding TV fame as Folger’s Mrs. Olson). The setting of this one is, of all places, the Louisiana bayou. The novelty of the location helps a little.

If all this whets your appetite for more monster movie lore, check out MCA’s new release of “Man of a Thousand Faces” (letterboxed, $40). The 1957 film stars no less than James Cagney as Lon Chaney Sr., the silent film actor who set the standards for monster portrayals. Directed by Joseph Pevney, and featuring Jane Greer, Dorothy Malone, Jack Albertson and Marjorie Rambeau, this is one of those rare birds: a well-done biopic that does justice to its famous subject.

Three other recent releases reveal, once more, that laser technology can sometimes enhance watching films at home but can’t improve bad stories: “Demolition Man” (Warner Home Video, letterboxed, $35), starring Sylvester Stallone and Wesley Snipes, comes with full-bodied wrap-around sound that magnifies the mayhem, and surprisingly wide banding for a film made in the 1990s; “The Man Without a Face” (Warner, letterboxed, $35), the quietly affecting 1993 film starring and directed by Mel Gibson as a disfigured loner befriended by a lonely young boy, transfers well with relatively narrow banding, but even state-of-the-art laser technology can’t help 1993’s “For Love or Money” (MCA, letterboxed, $35), the absurd Michael J. Fox romantic comedy in which he plays a concierge with “dreams.”

Laserbits

New Movies Just Out: “Manhattan Murder Mystery” (Columbia TriStar, $35); “Much Ado About Nothing” (Columbia TriStar, $35); “Striking Distance” (Columbia TriStar, letterboxed, $35); “Son-in-Law” (Hollywood, $40); “Hot Shots! Part Deux” (FoxVideo, $40); “Amongst Friends” (New Line, $40); “Fortress” (LIVE, $40); “So I Married an Axe Murderer” (Columbia TriStar, $35).

Old Movies Just Out: “My Favorite Year” (MGM/UA, 1982, $35), the classic comedy about early TV starring Peter O’Toole; “Bathing Beauty” (MGM/UA, 1944, $35), Esther Williams’ first starring role; “Support Your Local Sheriff” (MGM/UA, 1969, $35) the hilarious Western parody featuring James Garner.

Upcoming: MCA/Universal will release “Judgment Night,” starring Emilio Estevez, on Wednesday at $35; Warner’s “The Fugitive,” starring Harrison Ford, is due March 22 at $40; Al Pacino stars in “Carlito’s Way,” scheduled for April 20 (MCA/Universal, $40); “Fatal Instinct,” featuring Sherilyn Fenn and Sean Young in the genre parody, is due March 23 (MGM/UA, $35); Warner will issue “M Butterfly,” with Jeremy Irons, on April 6 at $35.