Let it never be said that having a low budget necessarily means you have to give up your dreams and go half-assed with things. 7 Mummies is testament to this. Managing to encompass Indian spirituality, zombies, crime thriller leanings, gun-toting action and crazy kung fu mummies in one film is a more than impressive feat.
Like the earlier Convent, 7 Mummies main strength is the way it accepts the trappings of it's genre and throws the kitchen sink in, making an idea that's been done a million times before feel fresh and new by taking it all to crazy levels. If you like straight to video horror, you can't really fail with 7 Mummies, it has lots of mad fights with crazy monsters, a genuinely unnerving villain in the always reliable Billy Drago (here kind of reprising his role from Tremors 4 but making him evil) and a whole bucketload of special effects and cool gore.
Still, to continue the Convent comparison, 7 Mummies does not display similar leanings toward gross-out humour. It's a shame really, as some of the movie is so daft that it's inherently funny. It takes itself pretty seriously, which is a bad idea given how astronomically stupid the movie really is. You're gonna need your 'disbelief suspension gear' on for this one.
Also, some of the movie is unnecessarily confusing. I'm pretty damn sure I didn't find out the characters names until halfway through the film, and characters seem to swing in and out of the main scene an awful lot, which makes your head spin a lot when some are genuinely getting killed off. Add to this the fact that the movie is stylishly but eye-strain inducingly dark, and it's just as well the movie is a barrel of undead laughs as the storyline regularly gets lost somewhere in the dusk and the lack of dialogue.
Still, most of the movie is of a consistently above-average quality. The actors aren't required to do much aside from run, fight or die, but they do so well, and it's nice to see Matt Shulze (remember him from Transporter?) and Cerina Vincent (Cabin Fever) getting some more lead roles. Billy Drago elevates the quality of the movie purely from his presence alone, and once again proves why he's the horror-director's choice.
The effects are good too, the zombies are suitably nasty and decomposed looking, and the gore is pretty grim (there's a lot of nasty stuff in here, including a head smashed like a melon against a wall among others) , making for a good solid old-school feel. Action sequences are handled fantastically, with great choreography and a genuine feel of mayhem to the large OTT fight sequences.
So, it's a fun movie that's exciting to watch. However, it can get really hard to follow at points, due to the physical amount of stunts and parallel scenes going on, not to mention the darkness of the movie. Worth checking out, you're unlikely to not find something you'll enjoy.
Like the earlier Convent, 7 Mummies main strength is the way it accepts the trappings of it's genre and throws the kitchen sink in, making an idea that's been done a million times before feel fresh and new by taking it all to crazy levels. If you like straight to video horror, you can't really fail with 7 Mummies, it has lots of mad fights with crazy monsters, a genuinely unnerving villain in the always reliable Billy Drago (here kind of reprising his role from Tremors 4 but making him evil) and a whole bucketload of special effects and cool gore.
Still, to continue the Convent comparison, 7 Mummies does not display similar leanings toward gross-out humour. It's a shame really, as some of the movie is so daft that it's inherently funny. It takes itself pretty seriously, which is a bad idea given how astronomically stupid the movie really is. You're gonna need your 'disbelief suspension gear' on for this one.
Also, some of the movie is unnecessarily confusing. I'm pretty damn sure I didn't find out the characters names until halfway through the film, and characters seem to swing in and out of the main scene an awful lot, which makes your head spin a lot when some are genuinely getting killed off. Add to this the fact that the movie is stylishly but eye-strain inducingly dark, and it's just as well the movie is a barrel of undead laughs as the storyline regularly gets lost somewhere in the dusk and the lack of dialogue.
Still, most of the movie is of a consistently above-average quality. The actors aren't required to do much aside from run, fight or die, but they do so well, and it's nice to see Matt Shulze (remember him from Transporter?) and Cerina Vincent (Cabin Fever) getting some more lead roles. Billy Drago elevates the quality of the movie purely from his presence alone, and once again proves why he's the horror-director's choice.
The effects are good too, the zombies are suitably nasty and decomposed looking, and the gore is pretty grim (there's a lot of nasty stuff in here, including a head smashed like a melon against a wall among others) , making for a good solid old-school feel. Action sequences are handled fantastically, with great choreography and a genuine feel of mayhem to the large OTT fight sequences.
So, it's a fun movie that's exciting to watch. However, it can get really hard to follow at points, due to the physical amount of stunts and parallel scenes going on, not to mention the darkness of the movie. Worth checking out, you're unlikely to not find something you'll enjoy.