Before Oscars, Michelle Yeoh and Brendan Fraser did the underrated Mummy 3

The ninety fifth Academy Awards ceremony is arising in every week, which nonetheless leaves curious movie followers somewhat time to compensate for the nominees — most of them can be found to stream by now. But as standard, the contenders are principally a bunch of significant tales. If you want a break from watching graphically ugly trench warfare in Netflix’s All Quiet on the Western Front, Brendan Gleeson performatively mutilating himself in The Banshees of Inisherin, or wealthy individuals projectile vomiting en masse in Triangle of Sadness, right here’s a palate cleanser for you.

Brendan Fraser is closely favored to win the Best Actor Oscar this 12 months for his mournful function in The Whale, whereas Michelle Yeoh is the odds-on favourite for Best Actress for Everything Everywhere All at Once. So why not take a few hours to look at the solely movie they ever made collectively? 2008’s The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor is available on streaming providers.

Granted, you gained’t get to see Yeoh tenderly caressing Jamie Lee Curtis’ face whereas sporting floppy, disturbing hot-dog-finger gloves. Or Fraser symbolically taking over different individuals’s sins in one other Darren Aronofsky Biblical metaphor. Dragon Emperor is the sort of film that didn’t even benefit the Oscars’ consideration again in 2008, earlier than the Best Picture class was expanded to gin up public curiosity in the awards by making room at the prime of the nominee record for mega-hits like James Cameron’s Avatar. It was tragically snubbed understandably missed by the Academy, nevertheless it’s nonetheless a reasonably enjoyable time as we speak.

And it’s much more fulfilling in the gentle of the interactions Yeoh and Fraser have had collectively on the awards circuit: Fraser tearfully hugging Yeoh at the Critics Choice Awards, Yeoh hauling Fraser into the Everything Everywhere group photo at the SAG Awards, the two of them gushing over one another’s initiatives on the A24 podcast after each ceremonies. (Yeoh says she desires to present director Darren Aronofsky a giant hug for bringing Fraser again to appearing.)

Photo: Michael Kovac/Getty Images for Champagne Collet & OBC Wines

The third film in the in style Mummy franchise didn’t do as effectively at the field workplace as the earlier two, nevertheless it was nonetheless a good $400 million hit, and it performs as lighter and far more meta than The Mummy and The Mummy Returns. Fraser is again as floppy-haired worldwide adventurer Rick O’Connell, although Maria Bello steps in to exchange Rachel Weisz as his spouse Evelyn. Their grownup son Alex (Luke Ford) kicks off the undead motion this time by digging up an historical Chinese emperor (Jet Li) cursed by immortal sorceress Zi Yuan (Yeoh). When a handful of devoted cultists resurrect the emperor, Zi Yuan and her equally immortal daughter Lin (Isabella Leong) be a part of forces with the O’Connells to cease him.

The one actually regrettable a part of Dragon Emperor is that Yeoh and Fraser barely share any display screen time. As a martial artist and magic wielder, Zi Yuan spends most of the film on mystical initiatives, whereas Rick spends his time racing round with weapons, swords, and improvised weapons, preventing cultists and making an attempt to maintain them from carrying out varied duties on their solution to reviving the emperor, breaking Zi Yuan’s curse on him, and reviving his immense CGI military of terra-cotta troopers. On their latest A24 podcast look, Fraser and Yeoh actually don’t have any joint reminiscences of the movie to share — aside from each speaking about how thrilling it was to work with Jet Li, and what a sweetheart he’s in actual life.

Image: Universal Pictures

But for followers of mildly goofy action-thrillers in the vein of the first Pirates of the Caribbean film, Raiders of the Lost Ark, and (most clearly) the first two Mummy motion pictures, Tomb of the Dragon Emperor is an underrated good time. It’s fast-paced and amiable, stuffed with household banter and huge, high-energy chases and fights, courtesy of The Fast and the Furious and XXX director Rob Cohen. Fraser is absolutely on board in his charming, boyish action-star mode. (It’s by no means actually believable that Alex is Rick’s son; Fraser is just about 13 years older than Luke Ford, and seems so much youthful when he’s grinning his manner by way of yet one more Errol Flynn-style stunt.)

Yeoh will get to point out off her appearing abilities in addition to her martial arts abilities on this film, together with her facet plot revolving round her shut, supportive relationship with Lin, and with Lin’s father in the opening flashback sequence. It’s solely a small echo of what Yeoh will get to do as a personality in Everything Everywhere All at Once or Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, nevertheless it’s nonetheless extra dimension than she will get in a whole lot of her preventing motion pictures.

But possibly the most charming and distinctive factor about Dragon Emperor is in the relationship between Rick and Evelyn, who’ve clearly reached the level of being bored (and brazenly sexually annoyed!) between world-hopping and mummy-fighting adventures, and who wind up seeing this newest jaunt as extra of a get-your-groove-back couple’s outing than a save-the-world disaster. The first Mummy film leaned into the horror of coping with an undead creature and its supernatural minions. By this level in the collection, the franchise was nearly charismatic individuals hanging out and getting some noisy, weapons-focused train collectively. It’s a cheerful, upbeat time-waster — for Fraser and Yeoh as a lot as for the remainder of us.

The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor is presently streaming on Hulu and Tubi, and is on the market for rental or buy on Amazon, Vudu, and different digital platforms.