Face-to-face with a pharaoh on IMAX screen

There's a moment in the new spectacular "Mummies: Secrets of the Pharaohs" when the face of a particularly well-preserved, 3,000-year-old Egyptian male dominates an enormous IMAX screen at Pacific Science Center.

While one marvels at the opportunity to look squarely into the visage of this ancient fellow, the film's narrator, Christopher Lee, says something that takes a moment to sink in. The body we see, removed from its mummy shrouds, Lee says, is that of Ramses the Great, Egypt's pharaoh during the Exodus. As far as we know, his is the only face from the Bible we can actually look at.

That's just one of the mind-blowing details that emerge from "Mummies," an exciting documentary that focuses on several aspects of the forgotten practice of mummifying the dead in preparation for the afterlife. Part of "Mummies" concerns the culture of mummification — the reasons for it, how it was done, etc. Another part focuses on the history of tomb-raiding in the desert along with more scientific ventures, such as the late-19th century discovery of a tomb holding 40 royals.

Forensic science also has a remarkable angle on the phenomenon, as DNA research suggests the possibility that mummified remains can tell us something about the long-ago origins of contemporary diseases. (A couple of minutes are devoted to a 10-year-old experiment in mummifying a modern cadaver.)

Each of these aspects of the story is boldly underscored by impressive recreations of burial rituals. Imaginative use of computer-generated effects provides a startling view of the way tombs looked before thousands of years of erosion stripped them of their original glory.

Perhaps most satisfying about "Mummies" is the way the Egyptian desert looks on that big screen, in images projected from the huge frames of a reel of IMAX film. The razor-sharp clarity of sand dunes in "Mummies" is somewhat reminiscent of those breathtaking, 70mm shots of the same desert in "Lawrence of Arabia" when the latter is seen on a wide, Cinerama screen.

Films fans who might or might not care about lost burial rituals can still find a lot of cinematic excitement here.

Tom Keogh: tomwkeogh@yahoo.com