Universal had a fair amount of faith in “The Mummy” as they released it on the first weekend of May, which typically signals the start of the summer movie season. Given the budget, they were hoping to make a big splash. They were going to have to do so with mixed response from critics. To this day, the film carries a so-so 62% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Even so, audiences were ready to embrace Brendan Fraser the action star, and Sommers’ vision for an action-heavy take on a horror classic.

With little by way of direct competition in theaters, “The Mummy” sailed to the top of the charts with a $43.3 million opening weekend of May 7, 1999. It was the biggest, non-holiday May opening up to that point, as well as the ninth-biggest opening weekend of all time. In short, out of the gate, it was a huge success. It held onto the top spot for two consecutive weekends before surrendering the crown to the monster that was “Star Wars: The Phantom Menace.” Be that as it may, Sommers’ film held its own even against such stiff competition.

“The Mummy” finished its run with $157 million domestically to go with $260.5 million overseas (at a time when overseas markets weren’t quite as robust as they are now), for a grand total of $417.6 million worldwide. Even against a sizable budget, there was no escaping its monster success. It finished as the sixth-biggest movie of the year, just behind Disney’s “Tarzan” ($448.1 million) and well above eventual Best Picture winner “American Beauty” ($356.2 million).

That was just the tip of the iceberg. Thanks to the booming home video market, “The Mummy” also helped Universal top $1 billion in home video sales for the year, shipping 7 million VHS copies of the film, as well as 1 million DVD copies, per Billboard. It was the second-biggest DVD of the year behind only “The Matrix,” which had itself a monster box office run in ’99 as well.