There's never been a Tarzan movie accurate to the books. One of the most recognizable characters ever created. And with more film incarnations than perhaps any other literary character with the possible exceptions of Sherlock Holmes and Frankenstein's monster. Yet for one hundred years (the book was published in 1912), none of the movies have ever gotten it right.
The first one, Tarzan of the Apes (1919), even screws up the writer's name in the film's opening image. His name was Edgar Rice Burroughs, not Edgar Rice Burrough. (The film has the possessive apostrophe inside the "s" when it needs to be outside.)
All other sources wrongly declare the first movie Tarzan to be Elmo Lincoln. But nope, not true. It's actually Gordon Griffith, the actor who plays Tarzan as a boy.
According to edgarriceburroughs.com, ERB, who wrote for 39 years until his death at age 74, spawned with his imagination 60 films and 250 television episodes. That would naturally include other characters, primarily John Carter and David Innes. The site also displays a quote from the great Ray Bradbury: "Edgar Rice Burroughs was, and is, the most influential writer, bar none, of our century."
Still, never an accurate Tarzan movie. Some, almost close. Most, nowhere near.
That's not even including the Disney Tarzan. Which to the purist perspective is awful because they get so many things wrong. It always comes down to the big question: Why? Why change anything? Come up with your own dang story! Don't give Tarzan dreadlocks. Don't make Tarzan small. Don't make Tarzan slide around like a skatepunk. Sheeta is the name for leopards, and Sabor is the name for lionesses. Separate, not interchangeable. Jane Porter has blonde hair, and there are black people in Africa.
But they never get it right.
"Me Tarzan, you Jane" is never a thing written in the books or said in the films. Just as Humphrey Bogart never says, "Play it again, Sam," in Casablanca, Johnny Weissmuller never says the former misattributed quote.
It is of course an outrageously ridiculous and racist premise that a rich white English baby wouldn't just crumple up from snakes, insects, and malaria in the first forty-eight hours. Nahh, this baby doesn't even need shoes--although if he was dancing around in Buckingham Palace he sure would.
Tarzans Gene Pollar, P. Dempsey Tabler, and James H. Pierce (who married Burroughs' daughter Joan) are real head-scratchers. Because of each man being physically in every respect not at all one bit like Tarzan, just makes ya wonder.
Originally Burroughs himself wanted Olympic decathlete Herman Brix (who later changed his name to Bruce Bennett) to play the Lord of the Jungle. After an injury posed a setback for Brix, MGM went with champion Olympic swimmer Johnny Weissmuller.
Burroughs later produced his own film version of Tarzan with Bennett starring. Bennett does a great job in Tarzan and the Green Goddess (1936), looking very much the part as described in the books. But the story is inexplicably set in...Guatemala. And yet we see footage of a rhinoceros and some lions. In Guatemala.
The same exact African animal stock footage gets used and re-used in Tarzan movies over and over, just like their rubber crocodile.
In the '60s TV series, Ron Ely was a blonde, short-haired Tarzan for the Civil Rights era. In the '80s, Miles O'Keefe has a bit part as the ape-man in the Bo Derek vehicle, and Christopher Lambert is lithe and says, "Oo, oo."
In the one from a few years ago Alexander Skarsgaard does a credible job, except for being blonde and wearing little pants instead of the requisite loin cloth.
The Filmation cartoon series "Tarzan, Lord of the Jungle" compares pretty well with the movie competition, actually.
Overall, a few of the Weissmuller movies are probably the ones most worth watching for sheer Golden Age movie charm. But even after a hundred years, it's never been properly done.
Stewart Kirby writes for
THE INDEPENDENT
