Factual error: The aircraft used to fly to Shangri-La is a Bristol Beaufighter, a single seat long range fighter bomber. It was not a transport aircraft and could not carry passengers. Some variants of the Beaufighter were two seaters but none at all could be used as small airliners as they do here. It is not possible to simply reconfigure the aircraft as shown here - the centre of gravity, balance and trim would all be thrown out. The resulting jury-built aircraft would be uncontrollable in flight.
The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor (2008)
Directed by: Rob Cohen
Starring: Brendan Fraser, Jet Li, Maria Bello, John Hannah, Luke Ford
Visible crew/equipment: Crew member's head is visible in the mirror at the back of the room, when Evelyn is playing with a sword. The head in the reflection turns and he smiles, as she jumps off the desk and moves out of frame. (00:16:00)
Revealing mistake: Right before Rick grabs the half of the broken dagger, he is starting to stand up, only to be kicked by the Dragon Emperor and slide back about 8 feet. As he starts to stand again, you can see that the background is exactly the same as the first time he tried to stand up - meaning that both moments were taken from the same shot, despite the fact that the background should now be different.
Trivia: Michelle Yeoh and Jet Li are martial arts icons of Asian Cinema and are real-life friends, as well as acting together on numerous films, but this marks the first time they are playing enemies.
Trivia: The name of first assistant director, P.J. Voeten, appears as the brand name of the dynamite which is planned to be used for the blow-up of the tower in the Gateway.
Trivia: The motorbikes with sidecars used in the chase are a playful homage to Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, in which Indy and his dad escape on a motorbike with almost the same configuration.
Jonathan Carnahan: I hate mummies. They never play fair.
Rick O'Connell: I. Really. Hate. Mummies.
Evelyn O'Connell: I think the feeling is mutual.
Jonathan Carnahan: Hey! You three-headed shape-shifting son-of-a-bitch!
Question: Why didn't Rachel Weisz reprise her role as Evelyn in the third film?
Answer: I read the reason she didn't want to do it was she had just given birth to her first child and didn't want to leave and do location shooting.
Question: Evie was able to translate the ancient Chinese on the Eye of Shangri-la, so that means she has some knowledge of the language. So why did she leave it to Rick to tell the resurrected General Min that they were on his side? (All she said in that scene was "I don't think he speaks English.")
Answer: Reading and speaking many Eastern languages can be entirely different tasks so it's perfectly plausible that she knew how to translate the writing but not how to speak it.
Question: Near the beginning of the film, in 1946, Rick and Evie are asked to take the Eye of Shangri-La to China as a peace offering from Britain, and a subsequent shot is them arriving in China in 1947. Since the task seems to be of extreme importance, why do they wait an entire year to deliver it?
Chosen answer: For one thing, just because two different years are shown does not mean that a full twelve months passed before they arrived in China. Also, travel to an undeveloped third-world country in the mid 20th century was not like it is today. There were no jet planes, much pre-planning and preparation would have to be done before departure, different modes of transportation would have to be arranged, and there would be many stops, delays, and transfers along the way. This could cumulatively take many months.
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Answer: Although she initially expressed an interest in returning, she reportedly disliked the script and ultimately chose not to reappear. While the producers initially considered writing the character out, with the story rationale that she had been killed in an air-raid on London during World War Two, it was ultimately decided that this would require too much rewriting and thus the character was recast.
Tailkinker ★