Curapedi I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

ChanFamous I wanted to like it more than I actually did... But much of the humor totally escaped me and I walked out only mildly impressed.

Juana what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

Scarlet The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

Leofwine_draca I'm surprised that I'd never heard of THE EYES OF THE MUMMY before I sat down to watch it as it turns out to be a superior and decent little chiller. It must be one of the earliest 'mummy' films out there even though the villain of the piece isn't a bandage-wrapped fiend but rather a sinister Arab character whose love for the film's heroine sees him pursuing her across continents.For a film made in 1918, THE EYES OF THE MUMMY feels surprisingly fresh and relevant. The lack of any real budget is quite obvious in the depictions of Egypt and the like, but the story packs plenty of incident into the running time and the characters are well drawn. Pola Negri is a good choice for female protagonist and convinces in her sympathetic part. Emil Jannings goes down the all-out pantomime route as the villain of the piece and is such a delight to watch. The climax goes down a surprisingly tragic route that more modern horror films would undoubtedly baulk at.

Steffi_P In the late 1910s, while Hollywood was focusing mostly on serious contemporary drama, their soon-to-be significant rivals in Berlin were turning more towards adventuresome flights of fancy. Myth, fantasy, exotic lands and a touch of horror were the hallmarks of German cinema. Although better known for his unique comedies, director Ernst Lubitsch was nevertheless a capable and versatile craftsman, and at this stage was at the forefront of the Germanic style.The approach to these pictures was all about space, and for Lubitsch the most important aspect of space appears to be depth. A lot of the movement in Die Augen der Mumie Ma is towards or away from the camera. Of course, Griffith and many others in the US had been doing this for years, but Lubitsch actually shuns horizontal movement, and his pictures seem designed to accommodate movement in depth. Often there is a large empty space behind the actors, or a doorway at the back of the set leading to another room. The bric-a-brac of Kurt Richter's elaborate set design tends to be concentrated at the sides of the frame, creating a kind of tunnel effect in some scenes.What is the point of all this? Well, I think first and foremost it was probably just a style that appealed aesthetically to Lubitsch and Richter, and there is no shame in that. Nevertheless it is one that they could use to great effect. Emil Jannings often appears to be advancing eerily upon us, while good guys Harry Liedtke and Pola Negri disappear worryingly away from us. In the few shots where the actors are backed up against a wall with no space behind them, for example in the flashback where Jannings first brings Negri to the tomb, the sudden change is palpable, in a nastily claustrophobic way. And depth plays a part in all the most chilling moments, such as Jannings appearing in a mirror at the far end of the room. We simultaneously see him in the distance yet are aware he is actually behind the camera, and thus behind "us". These are all moves towards a more interactive cinema, in which the audience are not merely external observers, but feel they are enveloped in the film's world.Die Augen der Mumie Ma is also notable for early performances by two giant figures of German cinema, the aforementioned Emil Jannings and Pola Negri. Like Lubitsch, Jannings's area of expertise was comedy, and his Radu is a hammy caricature. But Jannings's hamming was of a good sort, and just as his excessive mannerisms could make us laugh in pictures like The Merry Jail or Faust, here they come across as grimly macabre. Negri too is a little hysterical at times, but in fact far less so than many leading ladies of German cinema, and most of her performance is refreshingly restrained, comprised of slow, delicate movements.If there is anything significantly wrong with this picture, it is its naïve silliness. For example, Jannings is taken to Europe to become Hohenfels's manservant, and yet still potters about the prince's palace in his native garb, clutching his dagger and muttering about getting revenge on the woman who wronged him, whereupon the prince pats him amiably on the shoulder as if to say "There, there old chap". Mind you, it would probably have looked equally ridiculous had the murderous Radu been given a haircut and shoehorned into a butler's uniform. Such moments are an unintentional source of humour for me, so I don't regard them as so much of a bad thing. It goes without saying that screenwriter Hans Kraly was another collaborator on this picture whose main field was comedy, and he was most adept at creating romantic fables for fast-paced farces, a genre that doesn't exactly demand logic and cohesion. And yet, in the hands of Lubitsch, Jannings and Negri, Die Augen der Mumie Ma becomes an atmospheric and reasonably entertaining short horror adventure.

John W Chance The title refers to Pola Negri's eyes. Captured by the evil Arab, Radu, (well played by Emil Jannings) Negri, as 'Queen Ma,' is forced to be his slave and trick tourists in an Egyptian pyramid by hiding within a sarcophagus with her live eyes showing through its eyeholes. A visiting painter, Albert Wendland, (Harry Liedke) supposedly the hero, falls in love with her and takes her back to Europe.The film works as a kind of proto- 'Hammer Films' melodramatic thriller, as Radu follows her to Europe tracking her down and stalking her to seek his revenge on her having left him. Jannings is darkly made up, but we still get to see his menacing eyes and gestures that made him such a super star in the next decade after the film was made. (For some reason, it wasn't released in the United States until 1922.) Pola Negri does a good job showing her gratitude, devotion and love to Wendland, as well as her alienation from her new European environment and hesitation to participate in it. It's only when she performs a 'native' dance at her coming out party that she relaxes and begins to mix and fit into her new culture (as a popular exotic dancer). Woo! But her dancing! You haven't seen anything this funny since the Babylonian dancers in 'Intolerance' (1916)! All jerky hootchie kootchie motions which briefly profile the curves of her cello shaped body (actually this type of female body was popular in films and soft core during the teens and twenties).The action really picks up as all the coincidences have Radu closing in on Ma. The whole movie is pretty well edited, but the last fifteen minutes are especially well done. While the hero tries to rush to Ma's rescue, Radu exerts his hypnotic Svengali power over her, kills her, and then, after kissing her, out of remorse, kills himself. The hero rushes in, but...too late! This is the kind of tight little thriller / tragedy that Hammer would do so well in the sixties.The Alpha Video DVD I have features a continuous piano soundtrack by Rachel Guches that has some interesting dissonances, but also the pop tune 'My Reverie' (?).Even though the silent miming is a little too much, the film tells an interesting story, moves along at a good clip, and features good acting by Pola Negri and Emil Jannings. I give it a five.

reg8g I agree the film was not restored well at all. The music did not go along with the visual images. It seemed as though whoever wrote the score was just not paying attention to the movie. The music sounded rather chipper for scenes that seemed dark and a plot that is haunting. A new version is coming out March 28,2006 with a new music score. Hopefully that one will be much better. I heard that the new score is all piano and that the composer also did the score for The Mechanical Man. Which is a very rare old silent film that was found. Looking forward to seeing it. Hopefully the next version of Eyes of The Mummy will be much more better.