Matthew Corbeck (Charlton Heston) is an archeologist
obsessed with finding the tomb of ‘The Nameless One,’ an ancient Egyptian
queen hidden away due to her terrible crimes. He so obsessed, he virtually ignores to his pregnant
wife. His daughter is still-born on the day he discovers the tomb, and then miraculously
breathes again when he opens the sarcophagus. Eighteen years later his
estranged daughter seeks him out. They are both driven to gather the mummy and its
canopic jars to enact a ritual that could bring The Nameless One to life once
again.
The Awakening is a
loose adaption of Bram Stoker’s novel, Jewel
of the Seven Stars, but it has much more in common with The Exorcist (1973) and The Omen (1976). It attempts to recreate
the overwhelming dread of The Exorcist
but only manages to be plodding and a little dull. It also tries to tap into
the feeling of evil’s inevitable victory that is present in The Omen. Here it
is a little more successful, but is once again hindered by the slow pace. Their
is never anything particularly frightening that happens, but there a few moments of mild gore. I think the biggest issue is that the villain, The Nameless
One, is such an unknown quantity, that it’s difficult to be scared by her. We’re
told she killed thousands during her reign, but we never get a flavor for her
brand of evil. She’s just a blank slate we’re told to be scared of. The
Awakening is a valiant effort at classy horror, but it fails to entertain.
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