The Mummy (TF1): Tom Cruise insisted on shooting an airplane in free fall

Launched in 2017, Mummy He launched the Dark Universe, a new franchise started by Universal Pictures that was supposed to replace the monsters (werewolf, Dracula, etc.) of horror cinema from the 1930s to 1950s, thereby competing with Marvel superheroes. This feature film was a public and critical failure. Therefore, the project was abandoned. However, this reinterpretation of the character, interpreted by Boris Karloff in 1932, is still a mind-blowing pastime whose most beautiful attraction is the Egyptian princess who is thirsty for revenge. Unfortunately, Ahmanet, who survived his ancient sarcophagus, strikes fear into the world. French-Algerian Sofia Boutella lends her the feline and athletic silhouette she spent dancing with both choreographer Blanca Li and her years on tour with Madonna.

Director Alex Kurtzman saw this rare pearl in Matthew Vaughn’s Kingsman: Secret Service (2015), a brawny James Bond parody in which the actress is a killer mounted on sharp blades as a leg. ” From there, there was no one else for the role. Everything passes through his eyes. “Well seen. This former gymnast not only performs in action sequences where her body is bent through the craziest acrobatics, but also brings humanity to the partially computer-generated demonic creature. She also takes Tom Cruise before licking her face, like a lioness tastes her prey before she eats it.” You should see him beaten up too.” “She’s funny, we laughed a lot and worked hard,” says Sofia Boutella. She was the one who wanted to hit harder in the fight scenes.. “The serials he trained without counting.

On a plane in free fall

The movie is full of adrenaline-charged sequences. Roof to roof, under the bullets of Iraqi insurgents, descending to the bottom of the abyss, chasing through London, riding in the desert under the fire of the Mummy… Mission impossible accepted this brazen foray into horror cinema. With a good dose of self-teasing, there is a special forces soldier looting archaeological sites after the American army in Iraq. “ Tom said yes because he also loves the genre (unpublished in his filmography, editor’s note), but he didn’t want any compromises, he had to give everything, notes the director. I had him read the plane crash scenario. He told me, “Great. We’re going to shoot this. But it’s real! On a plane in free fallAs a result, the players made 16 parabolic flights (64 for technicians!) over the Bordeaux sky in an Airbus A310 from Novespace, a company specializing in gravity research. Bluff realism. And the excitement for the audience is there too.

The Mummy: Sunday, August 21 at 9:10 PM on TF1

Isabelle Magnier