Michael O'Keefe Not all love is lost. Reginald Le Borg direct this tale of the High Priest (George Zucco) summoning Yousef Bey (John Caradine) to New York's Scripps Museum to retrieve the ancient love interest, the Princess Ananka, from her resting place along with the insane mummy Kharis (Lon Chaney Jr.). Bey finds the soul of the princess has been reincarnated as a beautiful Egytian exchange student named Amina (Ramsay Ames). An Egytlogist professor (Frank Reicher) has been carrying out experiments and the jealous Kharis makes his appearance. As the charming student goes into strange trances, the professor is killed and the mummy makes haste with the rapidly decaying reincarnation.Other players: Robert Lowery, Barton MacLane, Lester Sharpe and Harry Shannon.

Nigel P Jaunty music accompanies cartoon style credits over a backdrop of hieroglyphics, which indicates this is not going to be an exercise in particularly dark horror. We open with a clip from the previous film in this series, of George Zucco, his back to the camera, travelling up many stone steps to a secret temple. As it is, for the purposes of this film, we are required to believe it is actually John Carradine's Yousef Bey ascending the stairway. George Zucco is actually inside the temple, his character Andoheb explaining the Mummy's story from previous outings, with the help of further repeated clips from those excursions.The sequels to the original mummy (1932) are so similar they fall into 'this is the one with …' categories. 'The Mummy's Hand' 'was the one with' Tom Tyler in the titular role, and its follow-up 'was the one with Lon Chaney Junior's first outing'. Sadly, this one is 'the one with' Robert Lowery as the 'hero', Tom Hervey: truly the most objectionable, obnoxious character in any Mummy film up until the Brendan Fraser caricatures begun their spiel in 1999. What a cocky, arrogant fellow he is. This member of the audience is instantly on the side of Kharis, who is resurrected once more, without much fanfare to stumble through Universal's back-lot to find his Princess Ananka (Ramsay Ames).I sound unnecessarily harsh towards 'The Mummy's Ghost', but despite the above (and the reuse of stock music from other Universal horrors/clumsy day for night shooting), its familiarity is reassuringly enjoyable. We know what we're going to get from a Mummy film by this time – and we do. Of Chaney's outings as the monster, this may be his most powerful. From behind Jack Pierce's mask and wrappings, he injects some emotion into his hated Kharis (although Pierce's mask crumples like a Cabbage Patch Kid when the monster is seen to scowl). It is rumoured during Kharis' raging attack on the night-porter (Oscar O'Shea) in the Scripp's museum, that Chaney actually slammed the old man into a real pane of glass, smashing it and injuring O'Shea. Alcohol has not been ruled out.There's an amusing bit of business where the locals, lead by Barton MacLane's cranky Inspector Walgreen, cunningly fashion a disguised pit in which to topple the Mummy, who doesn't even notice and (slowly) walks straight past!Cocky Tom's girl Amina (Ames) is slowly transforming into the putrefying Ananka, which is a welcome inclusion into the plot, but the gradual whitening of her hair goes unnoticed by others throughout, stretching credulity somewhat. Her total transformation into a Mummy as Kharis carries her into the swamp at the end is a certain high-point, and a surprising unhappy ending, although at least she has been spared a life of married bliss with Hervey.

utgard14 The Universal mummy series takes a step down with each entry but they're all fun. This time high priest George Zucco sends John Carradine after the infidels. Lon Chaney, Jr.'s back as the mummy, despite seemingly dying in the last film (we never saw an actual death, to be fair). Carradine tries to get the mummy of Princess Ananka but discovers her soul has been reincarnated in the body of a young woman (Ramsay Ames). Robert Lowery plays the leading man and Barton MacLane plays a cop. Ramsay Ames is a beautiful leading lady. It's easy to see why Lowery, Carradine, and even Kharis are crazy about her. Maybe these sequels are a little repetitive, but they're good times for me. I love Universal horror films. The Mummy series are short, fun escapist adventures with horror and some romance added to the mix. This one isn't the best but it's entertaining. Surprising ending too!

dougdoepke No need to recap the plot—the point is the mummy's on the loose again, dragging his foot behind. As a kid, I could never get too scared since the 3,000-year old guy moves like he's even older. So I figured why doesn't everyone just run away when he comes, but then his movies show how really good he is at trapping people, and how they're toast after that. Plus, he can have an occasional hissy-fit, as he does here when he re-decorates the museum with one big hammer hand. And guess who's cooking his tanna leaf dinner this time. It's scary old John Carradine looking and sounding like a voice from beyond the grave. Between them, I still get a few chills, even this many years later. But one thing has really changed between then and now. Now I follow the beauteous Ramsay Ames like a bee on honey. Okay, so her acting is not exactly Oscar bait—but with looks like that, it doesn't have to be. Thanks to her and my improved glands, I now understand why old bandage body keeps wandering around Universal's backlot looking for her in movie after movie. I would too. Anyway, not a whole lot happens on screen til that bang-up finale when you might say everything and everyone comes together in front of a rickety old trestle to nowhere. However, I do recommend that Miss Ames keep her beauteous make-up on, since that last frame does nothing for getting her a next job.