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The Mummy’s Hand

Year:

1940

Running time:

67 mn

Nationality:

USA

Language:

English

Genre:

Horror, Comedy, Adventure

Director:

Christy Cabanne

Producer:

Universal Pictures

Screenwriter/s:

Griffin Jay, Maxwell Shane, Ben Pivar

Cast:

Dick Foran, Peggy Moran, Wallace Ford, Eduardo Ciannelli, George Zucco, Cecil Kellaway, and others

Other websites:

Trailer:

Summary of the film
The general plot of the film presents the existence of a secret order of high priests of Karnak who watch over the tomb and the body of the princess Ananka, who is said to have lived 3000 years ago and who was the daughter of the pharaoh Amenophis (without specifying which of the kings who had this name during the Egyptian 18th dynasty). This memorial monument is located in the Egyptian desert, near the tomb of Kharis, who was in love with the princess and who, for the sacrilegious act of having tried to bring her back to life, was condemned to be buried alive. Since that time, Kharis has lain in a tomb next to that of Ananka, and is reanimated by successive high priests to eliminate all those who dare to violate her tomb. Kharis is therefore the mummy of the story, and the archaeologist Steve Banning and his partner Babe Jenson are the American adventurers searching for the location of the tomb and its treasures.
Interior and exterior of the temple of Karnak where the sarcophagus of Ananka is located (Screenshot by the author)
Flashback with scenes of Ananka's burial (Screenshot by the author)
Vessel with inscriptions describing the position of Ananka's tomb (Screenshot by the author)
Sarcophagus containing the mummy of Kharis in the vicinity of the tomb of Ananka (Screenshot by the author)
Egyptomania narratives or motifs
The Mummy's Hand was a Universal production that laid the essential foundations for later cinematic Mummy fiction. Thus, we have the intrepid American archaeologist in search of a lost tomb in the desert guarded by the priest of Karnak and his followers. The film reproduces the usual Orientalising scheme of the American as discoverer and man of science, set against the superstition represented by the local Egyptian inhabitants. Moreover, the hero secures the funding to carry out his expedition thanks to a fortuitous encounter with another American citizen and his daughter, while the Egyptian professor (and undercover high priest of Karnak) represents the antagonist bent on thwarting the Americans' plans. The attitude toward the Egyptians, who were not at all portrayed by Egyptian actors, is even contemptuous in certain parts of the film, as in the Cairo market where Babe's character demands that an Egyptian beggar shave. The Egyptians are also represented as unreliable men who provoke a fight in a bar, a moment that nevertheless serves as an opportunity for the American archaeologist to show his physical ability that characterizes him as an action hero as well as a man of science.
The idea of the curse of the mummy is also present. This falls on the character of Kharis, cursed for having defied the laws of the gods by trying to steal the tana leaves at the foot of the statue of Isis that grant eternal life (to give life back to his beloved Ananka). But equally the curse of the gods falls on all those who seek the tomb of Ananka, who will be eliminated by the action of the hand of the mummy of Kharis. Once again this threat represents the destructive power of the East: the American archaeologist is the usurper of the secrets long held by the priests of Karnak (the true location of Ananka's tomb) that trigger the return to life of Kharis, who without the priest's control could transform into a beast that would destroy all mankind. This issue is also evidence of the usual Orientalism and Imperialism with which Hollywood cinema, and before that Victorian literature, characterizes Egypt: the West colonizes the East and its secrets, and thus suffers the consequences.
The archaeologists also assume this role in the organization of the archaeological mission to find the tomb: as entrepreneurs, they sell their project to another American citizen who provides the money and thus acts as a capitalist partner (it is not surprising that in this system the Egyptians' recourse to try to thwart the plans of the Americans is to accuse them of swindling). The benefit expected by the investor is, as it is pointed out on several occasions in the film, the recovery of the investment, something he hopes to achieve with the possible discovery of sumptuous jewels in Ananka's tomb. It is, therefore, an archaeology that seeks to find treasures, as is usual in the portrayal of this discipline in American cinema.
The recreation of Egyptian archaeological sites in the film is not at all careful. The temple of Karnak does not look Egyptian, with the artistic team’s sole concern seemingly to make it look "ancient. The wall paintings are Egyptianizing, however, though the statues of gods (mainly the one of Isis at the beginning of the film) are not Egyptian in style. It is striking that the archaeologist of the Cairo Museum is named Petrie, like the well-known British Egyptologist.
Finally, it is worth mentioning the role of the film's female protagonist: the charming Marta Solvani. In this female character there are some of the usual characteristics of mid-century American cinema: on the one hand, she is the damsel in distress in love with the hero, but, on the other hand, she plays an active role in the discovery of the tomb as she is the one who manages to interpret the map to Ananka.
In the formulation of the myth of the mummy in this film, two issues are also addressed that, in mummy films to follow, did not have much in the way of an afterlife, such as the vivification of the mummy through so-called ‘tana leaves’ and the relationship between this return to life and the lunar cycle.

Author: Abraham I. Fernández Pichel

Other information
Day, J. 2006. The Mummy's Curse. Mummymania in the English-speaking world: 67, 69-71, 73-75. Routledge: New York.
Not available
McGeough, K. 2006. Heroes, Mummies, and Treasure: Near Eastern Archaeology in the Movies. Near Eastern Archaeology 69(3-4): 174-175, 178.
Open access
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Project Manager

Abraham I. Fernández Pichel

Researchers

Abraham I. Fernández Pichel - Rogério Sousa - Eleanor Dobson - Filip Taterka - Guillermo Juberías Gracia - José das Candeias Sales
Nuno Simões Rodrigues - Samuel Fernández-Pichel - Sara Woodward - Tara Sewell-Lasater - Thomas Gamelin – Leire Olabarría
Alfonso Álvarez-Ossorio - Jean-Guillaume Olette-Pelletier - Marc Orriols-Llonch


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