Tarzan the Fearless (1933)

This early Tarzan film, produced without the backing of a major studio, is primitive and crudely made, and the story (written by Edgar Rice Burroughs himself!) is formulaic, but it has plenty of action, some impressive animal performances, and, in Buster Crabbe, a Tarzan who is both sturdy and nimble. Lots of beefcake here. It would be welcome news if the entire serial (this movie is only the first 4 chapters) was discovered some day. **1/2 out of 4.

Tarzan the Fearless (1933)** (out of 4)Mary Brooks (Julie Bishop) travels into the jungle with some men to search for her missing father. Thankfully she runs into Tarzan (Buster Crabbe) who helps on her search as well as helps fight some of the bad people in her group. TARZAN THE FEARLESS is a pretty bad movie that features all sorts of campy moments but I think it remains watchable because it does have a certain charm thanks to its badness. Originally this was meant to be a 12-part serial but sadly that version is now missing. The producer basically took the first four chapters and turned them into this movie so that will explain why things sometimes don't make sense or that the story is jumping all around the place. Without the serial to see exactly what they did, it's hard to say if they improved anything but most of the time these serial chapters to features don't work. There are quite a few campy moments with this film and most of them are Tarzan himself. He has a really silly and annoying howl here that will certainly make you laugh. As with the first MGM film, Tarzan can't speak here so instead of talking to Mary he always breaks into this weird laugh that makes him seem rather slow. It's clear Crabbe was going for a different type of performance because he makes the Tarzan character more of a mentally challenged person than anything else. Bishop is certainly easy on the eyes as the love interest. Philo McCullough was actually good as the main villain and we get Edward Woods playing the good guy. The film is full of stock footage, fights with lions and of course the eye-rolling moment of yet another beauty getting into their bathing suit and going swimming when of course a croc shows up. TARZAN THE FEARLESS is a real mess of a movie but fans of bad cinema should get a few kicks out of it.I will also say that Turner Classic Movies showed a 87-minute version, which I actually found much better than an earlier version running 71-minutes and included on one of those public domain packs. If you think the fuller version doesn't make much sense try watching that shorter one!

The Tarzan of the movies was a sissy, compared with the blood thirsty apeman of the early Burroughs novels. The real Tarzan ate raw meat and the blood ran off his chin. Moviegoers might not have been up to this kind of realism. That aside, this is a worthwhile, albeit early, Tarzan film. Buster Crabbe was a better athlete than other actors who played the role; like Weismuller, Crabbe had an Olympic gold medal and was more muscular. He also had a skimpier costume in the pre-Hayes Office days.The plot skips all over the place, probably because it was edited down from an episodic serial. The chimp is there, playing cute, as he did in almost all Tarzan films. The trapeze or vine swinging work is considerably better here. If Buster Crabbe didn't actually do it, he appeared to be quite high and hanging on precariously. Unfortunately the Tarzan yell, a trademark of these films, is a mild bleat compared with those that came later. I miss that in this version.All in all, I'd give this a fair to good grade.

Buster Crabbe plays Tarzan in this short movie that was the first 4 episodes of a serial. He's GOT to be the first blonde Tarzan ever! I heard this was just awful. I admit the plot jumps around and the print I saw was in terrible condition--but I liked it. Mostly it was because of Crabbe--he had a beautiful, muscular body and was much better-looking than Johnny Weismuller. He also acted better--Weismuller always had a blank look on his face--Crabbe changes expression often. Also he wore the skimpiest lion cloth I've ever seen. His acting wasn't bad either--I was pretty surprised! He hated making this though--he said the "damned" monkey who played Cheetah was always biting him! I realize it's a matter of taste but I think Crabbe was easily the best-looking and sexist Tarzan ever.Worth taking a look at.