Tom Cruise plays a roguish armed forces associate who doubling as a tomb-raiding antiquities procurer, Nick Morton, who, along with smart-alecky partner-in-crypts, Chris Vail, earns his living digging up ancient artifacts, then selling for the highest price he can get on the black market. Soon the men join forces with noted Egypt expert and archaeologist (and Morton's chance to hook up) Jenny Halsey while in Iraq, where a mammoth underground burial site lies under the sand, housing a mysterious sarcophagus containing the dormant body of Ahmanet, an Ancient Egyptian princess cursed to evil after an attempt to murder her family and usurp the throne to become pharaoh. Now revived from her tomb, Ahmanet decides that Nick will be the new conduit to bring evil to Earth as the host for the god of death, Set.