Here is a favourite of mine from Hammer Films.  I am sure that the advertisement below is from an American newspaper because I don’t remember this as a Double Feature – and in my mind anyway ‘The Mummy’ would have been top billed.

This may have been a re-release some years after 1959

In 1895, in Egypt, the British archaeologists John Banning (Peter Cushing), his father Stephen Banning (Felix Aylmer) and his uncle Joseph Whemple (Raymond Huntley) discover the tomb of Princess Ananka (Yvonne Furneaux). Stephen Banning finds inside the tomb The Scroll of Life and reads it, awaking The Mummy of Anaka’s keeper and former lover Kharis (Christopher Lee). He has a heart attack and goes insane.

Later the Egyptian Mehemet Bey (George Pastell)  steals the scroll and controls The Mummy. Three years later, in England, we see Stephen Banning in a mental institution and John, his son.  has married.

The drama is about to start – and it does

The Mummy 1959

The Mummy 1959

The Mummy 1959  ABOVE – An early scene from the film where excavations are taking place – a very good and large studio set

The Mummy 1959 ABOVE – One of the best scenes in the film – where The Mummy breaks into Peter Cushing’s house intent on killing him – and would have done but for the intervention of his wife played by Yvonne Furneaux who so closely resembles  the Princess Ananka who Kharis ( The Mummy) had fallen in love with centuries before.

Kharis stops in his tracks as he sees the girl he loves

The Mummy 1959 ABOVE – Kharis captures and carries away Laura Banning and drops with her, into a swamp. His great love for her – expressed in his eyes and expression – is evident as he lets her go before he is shot and sinks into the mire.  A gripping and yet very sad scene where we feel such sadness for  Kharis The Mummy.

The Mummy 1959 ABOVE – again an early scene from the excavation set.  I would love to have been there in Bray Studios and looked at and walked on this film set.