For a Jungle Jim film this isn't half bad.
Or half good. The IMDB blurb reads "Nazis dressed to look like Great Apes
are looking for gold, and Jungle Jim must stop them.". No way I could pass
that up. It turns out to be a bit misleading - they are men in gorilla suits
looking for Nazi gold. But not Nazis. Just Trump supporters. Still it is
pretty crazy. Giant apes are throwing down rocks on wardens of an animal
sanctuary. One is killed who is carrying a letter from the head Warden to
Jungle Jim. A bird picks it up and delivers it to Jim. Faster than our mail
delivery these days. The bird turns out to be the smartest one in the film.
On another occasion Jim is tied up and the bird picks up a burning cigarette
and beaks it to Jim to burn the ropes. I need a bird like that. But not the
parrot that gives a running commentary of a gin rummy game. And calls the
woman a babe. That would be annoying. Though she (Suzanne Dalbert) is.
So these guys are dressing up as gorillas to scare away the natives from
a buried treasure that the Nazis left behind. At one point the gorilla throws
a knife at Jim and opens a leopard cage to stop Jim from chasing him. Jungle
Jim thoughtfully says "Pretty smart for a gorilla". There are in fact two
babes at the preserve - but no romance going on here. Not with Jungle Jim.
He must be waiting for Jane to show up. Weissmuller doesn't let down his
boy fans. He wrestles a lion, a tiger and when he falls into the water a
giant snake. Take that Tarzan. There is also a big shoot-out as well in which
a lot of people are killed - that surprised me. Directed by William Berke,
another fine B film director who also directed the first two Jungle Jim's
- this being the third.
Some of the best things about these jungle films are the stock footage they
show of animals - there is some good footage here and at the beginning of
the film the narrator gives an anti-hunting lecture which I fully endorse!.
Or at least don't call it a sport. Some sport. Call it a killing. You have
a gun and an animal going about its business has nothing.
