Our take
Mark Gatiss's Arthur Conan Doyle adaptation, his first ghost story for Christmas taken from somewhere other than M. R. James, is camp, clever and genuinely creepy, with Kit Harington's stiff-backed hero and Freddie Fox's louche Egyptologist trading barbs in candlelit college rooms. The mummy in full flight is terrifying, and the framing device has a lovely sting for Sherlock fans. One of the best of the modern run.
What happens
Oxford, 1881. The story opens with Abercrombie Smith, a model of Victorian manhood destined for medicine, unmanned by fear and banging on the door of a pipe-smoking friend, insisting a figure outside chased him. Seven weeks earlier, Smith hears from his neighbour Monkhouse Lee, a delicate student from Thailand, about the man in the rooms between them: Edward Bellingham, a brilliant but bad-tempered scholar of ancient Egypt whose unnatural researches are the talk of the college. Bellingham has bought a mummy at auction, Lot No 249, some forty centuries old. When students who cross Bellingham are attacked, one nearly garrotted and one nearly drowned, Smith suspects that Bellingham can bring the bag of bones to life and set it on his enemies. The tale returns to Smith's friend, who listens, takes it seriously and, it turns out, has his eye on rooms in Baker Street.
Can the kids watch it?
No BBFC rating found for this film. It has a terrifying mummy and attempted murders, so best for teenagers and up.
Cast and crew
Starring
- Kit Harington as Abercrombie Smith
- Freddie Fox as Edward Bellingham
- Colin Ryan as Monkhouse Lee
- John Heffernan as The Friend
- Jonathan Rigby as Styles
- James Swanton as The Mummy
Writer
- Mark Gatiss
Director
- Mark Gatiss