Absolute thrill seeking horror film of the year. Arguably the most gruesome horror film i have ever seen, but that being said, absolutely loved every moment of it! For horror fans, this is a must see! For the faint of heart…make sure you bring a friend!
Hot off the record-setting resurrection of EVIL DEAD RISE, writer/director Lee Cronin turns to one of the most iconic horror stories of all time with an audacious and twisted retelling: LEE CRONIN’S THE MUMMY.
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.
The film stars Jack Reynor, Laia Costa, May Calamawy, Natalie Grace, with Veronica Falcón. The film is written and directed by Cronin, and produced by James Wan, Jason Blum and John Keville. The executive producers are Michael Clear, Judson Scott, Macdara Kelleher and Lee Cronin.
Cronin is supported behind the camera by a team of sterling film artisans, including director of photography Dave Garbett, production designer Nick Bassett, editor Bryan Shaw, costume designer Joanna Eatwell, music by Stephen McKeon and casting by Terri Taylor and Sarah Domeier Lindo.
New Line Cinema, Atomic Monster and Blumhouse Present, A Wicked/Good Production, A Lee Cronin Film: LEE CRONIN’S THE MUMMY. The film will be distributed worldwide by Warner Bros. Pictures, only in theaters and IMAX® in North America on April 17, 2026, and internationally beginning 15 April 2026.
In Conversation with…
LEE CRONIN (Director / Writer / Executive Producer)
One of the things that Lee Cronin enjoys about being a filmmaker is not necessarily knowing what’s around the corner. And I didn’t necessarily think making a movie about a mummy or a movie called THE MUMMY would be next up on my dance card until conversation started around the topic of how maybe there hasn’t been a truly terrifying version made before. That drew my interest in, but as always, I needed to find a story. And once I did that—I found a piece of lore, a set of characters I was interested in, a story that takes place at two different times around the same people—I started to get really engaged and involved with what this thing could become. And it’s always hard to quantify or put your finger on, but a story at that point, if it gets its claws under your skin like it’s got you, I find it hard to let go.
With this film, the director wanted to tell a story about a buried secret. The Mummy’s in Egyptian lore. They’re always about secrets, things that you discover later on, but I also knew it wasn’t going to be something that was going to take place over 3,000 or 4,000 years, even though there is lore and elements of this story that do have that depth buried in the mystery. There are connections that go back thousands and thousands of years, but the key story is about someone who goes missing and gets returned, not necessarily sooner than expected, but sooner than an entire lifetime having passed. So, it felt like investigating that mystery—being able to get under the skin of that—was going to be a really interesting part and a real point of difference in this movie, and something I’ve always loved and enjoyed.
LEVELS
Lee Conin goes onto explain how he wanted to tell something that had more than just an A narrative, but also had other things going on within the background. So, there is a big detective angle to this, which is maybe a little different to a conventional horror movie that you might watch, whilst also having a lot of the traditional haunted house elements at play. The movie in my mind as I approached it was some sort of combination between POLTERGEIST and SE7EN—SE7EN encapsulating the more hard-boiled detective side of things, and some of the darker body horror, too, and then POLTERGEIST in terms of the exceptional circumstances that are faced. And then with the family in this movie, POLTERGEIST was also a touchpoint for capturing the domestic relationships and also the heart that was in place between the family. I definitely wanted to mash up some really dark themes with some warmth. And I always think family is a great way into a story, especially a horror story, because it’s something that we can all identify with
The director explains how the look of the monster was also very much inspired by the mystery in the story, and I love when things like that happen, rather than just saying, “Hey, let’s make it scary. Let’s make it creepy.” There’s a purpose behind all the choices that we made. There’s a purpose behind the color her skin is when we first meet her and how it develops. It might seem like she’s getting healthier, where in reality she’s actually starting to decay in a different way. So, all of that—the various stages throughout the movie that we wanted to explore with the monstrous look—was pretty meticulously planned out from the start.
HORROR
He goes onto point out that this is a movie that plays a number of different horror chords and I’ve got history and renown for being someone that creates some pretty gory set pieces and some quite shocking imagery. And this movie is no different in many ways, but it also plays with psychology, dread and chills as well. I think when it comes to gore and to imagery that is really arresting and sticks in your mind, it has to be earned. It has to be based on context. I think for me, the simple equation is to find characters that people fall in love with, and then maybe you can start to turn the screw and do horrible things to them. Without that connectivity to the characters, I think gore fails. When I watch movies that don’t have any character, weight, depth, or dimensionality, I become disinterested very, very quickly.
He feels the power of gore and horror set pieces that sear into your mind is it’s all part of the experience. I try and think of the movies that I make and the stories that I tell as some sort of dark ride or roller coaster. And sometimes it’s silence, and sometimes it’s just clicking towards the corner… but sometimes you also just need to be hit very dramatically in the face and in your mind with something that completely raises your heart rate and changes how you’re feeling about the experience at the time. And, yeah, the power of a frightful image is something really special and unique that I always love to play with and use to bring the audience on a ride and to entertain as well.
Cronin highlights how when you are trying to make great effect of horror scenes, there has to be something familiar about it, or at least for me, that’s what I’m always drawn to. So, if I look back at my last movie, EVIL DEAD RISE, there’s the infamous cheese grater scene, for example. I knew I wanted something domestic to be involved in the scene and to shock people, and I walked into my kitchen and hey, there’s the cheese grater. And it’s like, yeah, everybody has one in the kitchen. Everyone has a frame of context. This movie has some equally gnarly and unusual actions that take place, but again, always around slightly domestic things.
