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Jane Parker (Bo Derek) joins her father James (Richard Harris) and his
photographer Harry Holt (John Phillip Law) on an expedition to deepest
Africa, to find the escarpment, the inland sea and the
graveyard of elephants - but abova all, after a few scenes of skinny
dipping, she finds Tarzan (Miles O'Keeffe), and after him rescuing her
from a boa constrictor and a lion, he takes her with him and the two fall
in love, while her dad is worried sick. Eventually, she returns to her dad
and company, and almost immediately, they are captured by a native tribe,
who paint a topless Jane white (those monsters) and stab her daddy with a
piece of ivory ... but then Tarzan comes by, kills their chieftain - after
which the natives just disappear from the film -, and he and Jane and a
horny orang-utan live happily ever after. What was MGM
thinking when they handed the Tarzan-property over to John
and Bo Derek? I mean, this film is really bad, more of a celebration of
Bo's boobs than anything else (though to be fair, she has lovely boobs),
while her performance is godawful. Still, she's the center of the movie,
and director John Derek wastes little time focussing on the plot's
inherent adventure aspects (and he is horrible at directing action) or on
its exotic locale. Even the few jungle animals involved lose out to Mrs
Derek's charms ... er, boobs. And Tarzan? He has very little screentime
and is reduced to supporting status in his own film - which is just as
well though, since Miles O'Keeffe isn't much of an actor. All that said,
there is still plenty to enjoy in Tarzan the Ape Man (if for all
the wrong reasons) if you see the film as a piece of comedy: Take Richard
Harris' outrageous overacting perfectly outbalancing Bo Derek's
understatement (or should we say underachievement), take a scene of Jane
musing that she and Tarzan are both virgins, made all the funnier by
Tarzan's monkey friend populating the background, take the natives who
have never been exposed to the outside world yet have cogwheels in their
village, take Jane and Tarzan's fight against the boa constrictor that was
obviously inspired by Bela Lugosi's legendary fight against a giant
octopus in Ed Wood's Bride of
the Monster, take Jane's complaints about being painted white by
the natives (those bastards!), take the scene with the beach lion, or take
the final scenes in which Tarzan and his horny orang utan friend fight
over topless Jane ... all that and much more turns this film into a laugh
riot, a perfect party film, almost a must-see - unless of course you are a
serious Tarzan-fan or find it despicable to laugh at
something and not with it.
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