TALE OF THE MUMMY

GB / US
1999
1hr 55mins
Dir: Russell Mulcahy
Starring: Sean Pertwee and Lysette Anthony

An Egyptian prince rises from the grave and attempts to gain immortal power

This Anglo-American horror has a very interesting scene filmed at Old Street station on the Northern Line. This features 1972 Mk1 tube stock in the very last months of Northern Line operation. One train that arrives into the platform is one of the two ‘blue-doors’ four-car units (either No.3227 or 3518), instantly recognisable as being the only such deep-level tube trains to carry the experimental colour scheme of silver with blue doors. By this stage, only four trains of 1972 stock were still operating on the Northern Line. One of the other sets seen in this sequence, No.3202, was painted in what was later chosen to become the standard LUL corporate livery. The film received a theatrical wide release on 13th February 1999 yet rather curiously, the North American version is only 88 minutes in length, considerably shorter than the European version of 115 minutes.

The London Underground scene begins with a sequence that opens with this shot of a ‘train’. It is not any train from the UK and, assuming the viaduct to be real (probably one on the DLR system), then the train is a CGI creation. All rather odd really.
A train of 1972 stock runs into Old Street station on the Northern Line
Part of the concourse and circulating area at Old Street station
Edward Tudor-Pole and his Alsatian dog on the platform at Old Street
Although this train of 1972 stock is partly obscured by a running Sean Pertwee it is quite clear that this is a very rare glimpse of one of the ‘blue doors’ units used on the Northern Line for a year or so prior to their withdrawal in February 1999.