Lee Cronin Breaks Down The Mummy’s Twist Ending | Interview
Lee Cronin’s The Mummy scared audiences earlier this year with an intriguing Egyptian mystery. To promote it now being available on Digital, Cronin discussed the horror movie’s ending and grossest moment with ComingSoon editor-in-chief Tyler Treese. It will also be available to own on 4K, Blu-ray, and DVD on July 14.
“The young daughter of a journalist disappears into the desert without a trace—eight years later, the broken family is shocked when she is returned to them, as what should be a joyful reunion turns into a living nightmare,” says the official synopsis.
Tyler Treese: Lee, I wanted to ask you, now that we’re after release, about the twist ending and epilogue. Was that always how the film ended, or what kind of creative iterations did you go through before arriving there?
Lee Cronin: Yeah, it’s a good question, Tyler. I always view the ending of the movie as kind of the last 30 minutes. For me, in terms of my process, that last 30 minutes is often in a little bit of flux as we figure out how to piece it together and get it just right.
I always think back to the writing process. There are the 100 or 120 pages you bring to set, but there are also lots of other scenes, moments, and ideas that didn’t make the shooting script. So there were a couple of things that came and went and then came back again.
At one point, there was an ending that was a little more fatalistic and maybe ended on a slightly more downbeat note, albeit a bittersweet one. But as we progressed through the shoot and looked at how the story was coming together, we felt it was important for the audience to have some sort of release at the end of the movie and for there to be a full-circle moment.
Ultimately, that’s why I settled on it. We have an evil force within the film, and the very concept of the story is that it cannot be defeated — it can only be contained. That’s the very reason Katie is taken. So I looked toward the Magician and the strings she had pulled in terms of Katie being kidnapped and what had happened to that family. It felt like returning the evil back home was a really interesting place to exit the story and to give, as I said, some kind of catharsis or relief, both for the characters and for the audience.
Tyler Treese: Yeah, it’s also an interesting epilogue because you can definitely read it as a happier ending on a base level since these are our protagonists. But it’s essentially the family stooping to doing the same thing that kicked off the story, so they’re corrupted to an extent. Do you think in a situation like this, everybody kind of gets their hands dirty?
Lee Cronin: Yeah, I think so. With something like this, what other choice would they have at that point in time? The family was broken when Katie was taken, and Katie has been returned, but she’s not the Katie they think she is. Then, when they finally get their daughter back, Dad is gone as well.
So I think, inevitably, blood is spilled, and hands get dirty if they want to right the wrong, settle the score, or balance the scales in some way.
In both this and Evil Dead Rise, you’ve had some real standout gross moments. I feel like the toenail scene in this, and the skin ripping from the shin, was just so disgusting to me. I rewatched it last night and thought, “Surely this can’t be as bad as the first time I saw it.” No, the anticipation actually made me even more uncomfortable. Can you talk about designing that scene and knowing where the line was in terms of how far audiences would go with you?
Yeah, I think it was an idea that was in the screenplay from quite early on. Not everything, but most things that I put on screen that have that intensity or come from a really gory place and make people squirm, shout, and scream—which is part of the experience—still have to be more than just a piece of violence or a gnarly moment.
In this particular movie, it was something I really wanted to do. But when you look at the setup for it, it’s actually quite tender. It’s about a grandmother, a mother, and a granddaughter trying to bring her back around. They’re trying to tend to her, beautify her, make her feel better, and bring her back to the girl they remembered — or the girl they hoped they’d brought home.
From that point of view, there was a tenderness to it. Then there’s the violence, but it also feeds into the mystery. It’s not just skin getting ripped off so blood can be shed. It actually opens up an avenue of mystery for Charlie, our central character, to investigate.
Thanks to Lee Cronin for taking the time to talk about The Mummy.
Source: Comingsoon.net