When people talk about loud, over-the-top, summer spectacles that fail to deliver on their promise, they are talking about films like The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor. Now, it's not that I didn't enjoy the previous Mummy movies. I did. They're classic examples of popcorn chomping, fire-and-forget films that leave no real lasting impression, but sure are fun while you're watching them. But not the third thinly spread, installment of the cliffhanger-inspired series.

The movie just sadly crumbles beneath its own silliness. They've gone too far, exhausted the characters and are now trying to recapture magic that has long since gone away. And sadly, this special feature-packed DVD serves only to illustrate how they went about spending a lot of money on a very pretty piece of cinematic noise.

The DVD special features are about as rapid-cut as the film, darting back and forth between talking heads, stringing together bits of dialogue to tell one coherent story about the making-of the film. The one thing I can say, definitively, is that the special features tell you everything you need to know about how they conceived and made the movie. But many of you who read my column on a regular basis might be aware that I often condemn DVD special features that simply serve to pat the filmmakers on the back -- especially for a film undeserving of such praise. That's this disc, to a T.

What I found most surprising was the complete lack of interesting, solid information about China and its history. When I clicked on the segment about the Terracotta Warriors, I expected some kind of short doc on the history of the warriors, the people who discovered them, and the many theories about how they existed. And while there are a few very cool facts scattered about, it was mostly a feature focusing on what a great idea using them as the villains was and how they went about recreating the army for the film.

When all is said and done, The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor is as flat and uninteresting as a DVD as it was a film. It sure is pretty, but there's nothing here worth spending your time on.

The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor is available now from Universal Studios Home Entertainment.

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