Tarzan's Magic Fountain
Director: Lee Sholem
Year: 1949
Rating: 5.0
After 12 Tarzan films from 1932 to 1948 Johnny Weissmuller
called it quits on playing the King of the Apes to instead play Jungle Jim
for 13 films. Clearly, he liked the jungle or the jungle liked him! The first
six Weissmuller Tarzan films were produced by MGM and are quite good - but
then the franchise was taken over by RKO where they got progressively cheaper
and worse. The last few were dreadful. But RKO thought there was more life
in the series - and truth be told Tarzan is still going all these years later
- and so they hired the very good looking Lex Barker who they had under contract
to take over the role. I was hoping a younger Tarzan would re-energize the
series, but no such luck. This is pretty mediocre on all counts. Barker was
to go on and star in four more Tarzan films which I really hope are better
because I have always loved the Tarzan character and I already have all five
films!
His Jane is still being played by Brenda Joyce who took on that role when
the series went to RKO because Maureen O'Sullivan had a contract at MGM -
she was lucky. So for a few films Jane was off in England and not in the films
but showed up for the final four films with Weissmuller. After this first
film though she is gone - not just leaving Tarzan in the jungle but leaving
the film business altogether. I mean how many times can you get Tarzan in
trouble before you have had enough? At least thankfully there is no Boy in
this one.
A good rule of thumb of the quality of a Tarzan film is how much time Cheetah
gets. A lot as it turns out in this film. If you were a kid sitting in a theater
on a Saturday afternoon these were probably great fun, but for adults not
so much. In this one Cheetah finds a wrecked plane from 20 years ago and
a notebook which indicates that a famous female pilot was in it and may have
bailed out. She can free a man back home and so Tarzan takes 5 minutes to
find her in a hidden tribe full of hot blondes and dishy brunettes. Maybe
they were on their way to a Miss Universe Pageant when the plane went down.
This village also has the secret of eternal youth so the aviator is still
a babe too (Evelyn Ankers).
Word leaks out and others want in on this eternal life thing. They always
do. And Jane as usual makes bad decisions about human nature- i.e. trusting
it. At least in this one Barker doesn't swim or fight a lions or a tiger -
but he does swing on a vine and smile a lot. He has a great smile. In fact,
very little happens of any excitement but that darn Cheetah is always up
to mischief! In the film also as the elderly husband is Alan Napier who many
years later played Alfred in the Batman TV series.
And speaking of Batman, someone really has to take Tarzan and make it dark
and terrifying - make him a true killer - a savage - not noble at all - just
a survivor and really good at it.
