Tarzan the Ape Man (1981)

Tarzan the Ape Man (1981): Dir: John Derek / Cast: Bo Derek, Miles O'Keefe, Richard Harris, John Phillip Law, Steve Strong: Shameless dreck right down to its dim photography. Title indicates that the film is about a man with limited social understanding. He may require extreme psychotherapy after this film. Plot doesn't matter because it would make better toilet paper than a script. A escapade through the jungle by explorers who hear various wailings and realize that it isn't a parakeet. The first problem with this stupid film is its advertizing aimed at a younger audience yet it seems more interested in Bo Derek's nude scenes. Director John Derek takes a half hour to showcase Tarzan wrestling a python. The snake drapes down upon Derek who can clearly escape had she used common sense but she is required to coil up in it and scream endlessly. She cleans up Tarzan with hints of sexual activity, which leads to his fondling her. Derek's overacting is backed by horrid work by Richard Harris, John Phillip Law, and Miles O'Keefe as perhaps the worst Tarzan ever. The hidden purpose is to showcase Derek in various sexual positions and exploit the hormones of anyone who likely shouldn't see it due to its marketing appeal to younger viewers. It is not something that she will likely wish to have showcased at any career gala. Frankly, the best place for this film is underneath an elephant's foot. Score: 1 / 10

This was an EXTREMELY unimpressive movie marred by, among other things, Tarzan's inability to act. However both Bo Derek and Miles O'Keeffe are EXTREMELY pleasant to look at. So when the movie was over and the end credits rolled, not a soul stirred in a fairly packed cinema, every last person sat bone still and glued to the screen throughout the whole of the end credits.Now why one might ask would an audience do that for such an unimpressive movie? It's because Bo Derek and Miles O'Keeffe were engaged in passionate lovemaking, stark naked on the beach as a background to the whole of the credits. Most faces were at least slightly red as the lights came on and everyone could be seen as having watched the whole time.I had to wait till everyone else had left the cinema, as my girlfriend had been wearing a sky blue cotton, skin tight shift that day. The squeal of embarrassment she let out after standing and discovering that a large patch of it had turned dark blue where it had been inconveniently moistened by her arousal, followed by her rapidly diving back into her seat, is to this day one of my favourite memories.A one star movie is for me a movie that I walk out of. I did not walk out of this one, so that makes it at least a two star. The above however raises it's score to a three star.

You know Leonard Maltin once said that for this movie he might have to think of a rating lower than bomb. After seeing this cinematic atrocity, I'd have to rate it as "Nuke" as well. Geez, how the Hell can John Derek take a movie that's basically about a hot blonde's chestal units and STILL make it boring (incidentally you don't even get a glimpse until almost an hour into the movie. But you DO get Richard Harris running around in a skimpy nightshirt as compensation. Yay?)Other lowlights? It takes forever for the film's namesake to even appear in this film (and does nothing) and Bo can't carry the movie by herself since she has yet to learn any other expression besides "vapid." (They could have gotten a blow-up doll to stand in for Bo with little difference.) Richard Harris meanwhile is hammy enough to be packaged by Hormel. And like a ADD-addled child getting Baby's First Camera, John Derek randomly pounds on every "camera trick" button with idiotic resolve! A sloooooow-motion fight with a snake overlayered with dissolving images is the pinnacle of this inept, overlong nonsense.The plot? Basically Jane, Tarzan, and a particularly frisky orangutan have engage in very, very dull foreplay. "Scary" painted Natives intervene for some reason (more nude scenes! Duh!)Seriously people, avoid this atrocity and stick to outright porn. You'll at least get a more coherent plot and better acting that way.

Tarzan's catch phrase was always, "Me Tarzan, You Jane." Here the dumb dumb can't talk at all, but Bo tells him, "You're more beautiful than any girls I've known" and of course the most overused line in nasty movies, "But I'm still a virgin" (It just looks like I've done this nude scene fifty times before.) Tarzan rescues Jane from a ferocious lion and not one little thank you or kiss goodnight. She just runs to the lake screaming "Leave me alone!" I often think, the scenes in the pond with Jane and Tarzan are so drawn out, maybe we could use an idea from William Castle and have thumb tacks spring up in the audience seats after sixty minutes to wake them up. Bo's nudity only appears in the closing credits, playing with Tarzan and the orangutan. It should have been put in middle before the hunter(Richard Harris) finds them. Bo Derek seems to be posing for some type of soft-core pictorial where acting is not required.