'Mummy 3' Better On Blu-ray Than Cinema

Rob Cohen, director of The Mummy 3, said the Blu-ray Disc edition of his film will look superior to the theatrical exhibition.

Cohen said he improved the film quality in post-production by making a digital intermediate print.

“It is fantastic, a filmmaker’s dream really,” Cohen said at a junket. “Stefan Sonnenfeld and Company 3 and I have worked for the last three months to get the print looking like what you saw. No matter how good the cinematography is, there is new potential to make the image more impactful beyond what you can do on location or on the set. So when you do Blu-ray you have an up-rezing quality so things that were sharp before become sharper.”

Blu-ray also enhances the work done by visual effects artists on the creatures unleashed by the mummy.

“Things that are dimensional, like the dragon lunging at the camera, in Blu-ray really knock your head off because you are seeing all the details we put in it that are even a little better defined,” Cohen said. “The dark/light values are better so you can be darker and still see all the detail. Plus you have many more layers of ancillary material, and much more information.”

Cohen already was a fan of DVD in its superior preservation to VHS and said videos give a film immortality.

Mastering the sound for home theaters also will allow for additional dynamics on the Blu-ray version.

“It will sound better on that Blu-ray than in any theater in America,” he said. “I’m a major fan.”

Now Cohen is hoping his earlier films such as Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story and The Fast and the Furious will appear on Blu-ray.

“No one has come to me for that yet, but I would so be down for that. I really hope they do. In fact I’m calling Universal [Studios] Home Video. I didn’t even think about that.”

The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor is now playing in theaters.