‘The Mummy’ director says Tom Cruise movie was ‘biggest flop of his life’

In 2017, Universal Pictures presented in style its plans for the Dark Universe, a saga of interconnected films following the mold of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, starring modern versions of their classic monsters (Frankenstein, The Invisible Man, The Werewolf…), with a stellar cast that included Johnny Depp, Javier Bardem and Russell Crowe as a link between films by way of Nick Fury.

Witness the beginning of a #DarkUniverse. pic.twitter.com/8g9eIbQfGa

? #DarkUniverse (@darkuniverse) May 22, 2017

The one in charge of kicking off the franchise was ‘The Mummy’, a reboot starring and produced by Tom Cruise and Sofia Boutella. However, the film was destroyed by critics and the box office fell short of expectations, prematurely canceling the Dark Universe, which It went down in history as one of the biggest flops in recent Hollywood and a warning to the rest of the studios: be careful not to start the house from the roof.

Five years after that debacle, the director of ‘The Mummy’, Alex Kurtzman, is ready to talk about what happened. During an interview for The Playlist web podcast, ‘Bingeworthy’, he described “brutal” his experience in ‘The mummy’ and described it as “the biggest failure of my life, personally and professionally”. However, with the perspective of time, Kurtzman has preferred to stay with the positive, that is, what the experience taught him about working in Hollywood.

“I tend to adhere to the point of view that you learn nothing from your successes and you learn everything from your failures”Kurtzman said on the podcast, where he expressed that, although “There are a million things I regret” in reference to ‘The mummy’, “He also gave me many gifts that are extremely beautiful”. “I didn’t become a director until I made that movie”keep going, “And it’s not because it was well directed, but because it wasn’t. I feel very grateful for the opportunity to make those mistakes because it made me a stronger person.and also in a filmmaker with the clearest things”.

Thanks to the failure of ‘The Mummy’, Kurtzman says: “Now I feel those gifts all the time because I have it clearer when I have the feeling that something is not right”and adds: “I don’t stay quiet anymore. I literally don’t move on when I get that feeling. It’s not worth it to me. And you can’t get to that place of gratitude until you’ve had that experience.”.

Universe reinvented

‘The mummy’ grossed 409 million dollars worldwide, a figure that today may seem high, but in 2017 it was a considerable disappointment for the study, which projected a higher result. The failure of ‘The Mummy’ was accentuated by the fact that the film only managed 80 million in the United States, with 80% of its total box office coming from international profits. Without the North American market behind it, it made no sense for Universal to continue their Dark Universe.

Despite everything, the company did not abandon its intention to update its emblematic monsters, instead, he completely restructured his plans with new modern versions independent of each other, which would have the support of the production company Blumhouse. The first of them, ‘The Invisible Man’, starring Elisabeth Moss, was a critical and commercial success, confirming that Universal was on the right track. Among his next projects within this reinvented Dark Universe are ‘The Werewolf’ with Ryan Gosling and ‘Renfield’, a rereading of ‘Dracula’ starring Nicolas Cage.