The Legend of Tarzan (2016) | Film Review

I am a Tarzan nut.  Let’s just get that out of the way.  From a very early age, the adventures of Lord Greystoke/John Clayton/Lord of the Apes/Tarzan have enthralled me through countless books, movies, comics, and TV shows.  My earliest onscreen memory of the character would have to be Ron Ely’s small screen portrayal that ran on TV in the late 60s, which I caught on reruns.  I was immediately taken by this stoic hero raised by apes, a man who represented the best of humanity even though he was raised as an animal.  To see him swinging from vine to vine through the jungle was a joy, and when evil doers were doing their evil deeds, there was nothing as thrilling as hearing that iconic yell echo out across the treetops.  Bad guys beware: Tarzan is coming.

Tarzan, who recently celebrated his 100th birthday, is one of those characters that transcends generations.  Like Superman, he is someone who is instantly recognizable to young and old alike, even if you have never watched or read his adventures.  How many of us have used the line “Me Tarzan, you Jane” with a significant other, or mangled his famous cry while pounding our chest like an idiot?  To know Tarzan is to love him.  He doesn’t have any super powers really, or a snappy wardrobe.  He’s just a man who stands up for those who are downtrodden, no matter what their species.  That’s why we like him.  And you gotta admit, he’s quite the swinger.

The Jungle Lord’s last live-action big screen appearance of note – I’m ignoring Casper Van Dien’s 1998 take on the character, “Tarzan and the Lost City”, which was a critical and box-office implosion – was way back in 1984 when Christopher Lambert (the “Highlander” guy) portrayed our hero in “Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes”, a more serious take on the character which I admire quite a bit.  That means, with the exception of Disney’s 1999 animated version, I’ve been waiting more than 30 years to hear that famous cry in the cinema again.  

And now, finally, that time is here.

Man, was I jazzed for this film.  “The Legend of Tarzan” had a budget of $180 million, an outstanding cast, the trailers looked great, and David Yates – the director of the last four Harry Potter movies (which I loved) – was behind the camera.  This was going to be the Tarzan film I’d been waiting for.  Big screen, high adventure that would bring back those tingly feelings of my childhood.  Enough talent and money to erase the memories of those low budget, 1990s syndicated TV shows that were far from quality.  I felt, honestly, that I was on the verge of something truly great.

Now that I’ve seen it, did I get what I wanted?  Well, not exactly.

“The Legend of Tarzan” has Alexander Skarsgard as the latest incarnation of Edgar Rice Burrough’s most famous creation.  As the movie opens, we find him settled down in England, seemingly quite comfortable in his role as the Lord of Greystoke Manor, a sprawling estate in a very foggy England.  Wait, what?  Yes folks, this is not an origin film.  This story begins with John Clayton (that’s his birth name) already married to Jane (the always lovely Margot Robbie), his days of leaping about the treetops far behind him and his loincloth probably getting moth-eaten inside some ornate wardrobe secreted away in one of the many cavernous rooms of his castle/mansion.  And don’t call him Tarzan.  He doesn’t like that very much.

He’s also a bit of a gloomy Tarzan, this one.  He doesn’t smile much in the beginning, but he has his reasons.  He is obviously uncomfortable with his current celebrity status throughout the Kingdom and is still suffering from a huge personal loss that I will not reveal here.  When he is asked by some lords and ministers to return to the Congo region of Africa to aid in a political matter of huge importance to the realm, he politely turns them down.  His Africa days are behind him, he tells them.  He will never return.  With that, he leaves them to their own devices, and heads on back to his palatial digs.

Yeah, right.  We know that’s not going to last very long.  He’s barely out the door when he’s stopped by George Washington Williams (Samuel L. Jackson), a wise-cracking American who had witnessed his refusal to return to his homeland, but manages to convince him otherwise with stories of John’s former countrymen being forced into slavery and other diabolical deeds.  After a bit of domestic squabbling with the missus about her staying behind – which he insists on, but she is against – John, Jane, and George are on their merry way back to the lands that birthed a legend.  Little do our intrepid trio realize, however, that trouble is awaiting in the forms of a devious Belgian named Leon Rom (Christoph Waltz) who has diamonds on the brain, and a vengeful tribal chief, Mbonga (Djimon Hounsou), who has a serious axe to grind with our hero.

This movie started out great.  I was genuinely intrigued with the approach the filmmakers took by starting the story with a world weary Tarzan – reluctant to once again take up the mantle of Jungle Lord – and avoiding a long rehash of an origin story that has already been told many times.  We do get to see how he became Tarzan, but it is told in a series of short flashbacks which, though brief, give the viewer an exciting and complete rundown on the history of our hero.  For the uninitiated, these blasts from the past will more than bring them up to speed on any important points they might have not known otherwise.  For those of us who know the story forwards and backwards, it gives us more time to explore other aspects of the life of Tarzan.

There is real drama in these early scenes.  I thought I would be put off by the lack of jungle action for a lengthy part of the beginning, but I truly got caught up in this version of Tarzan and Jane.  It isn’t all romance and fun for these two.  The clouds that perpetually hang above Greystoke Manor are as much metaphorical as they are literal.

Once they hit the road though, things begin to falter a little.  There is, of course, a change in tone once the cloudy skies of England are replaced with the sun dappled vistas of Africa, and that change is more than welcome.  However, this isn’t the only time the tone of this film changes, and it’s not always for the better.  The moments of intense drama I was enjoying so much are often brought to an abrupt end by humor that is admittedly effective a lot of the time, but similarly off-putting.  At one moment we are witnessing the true horrors of slavery, and in the next we see Sam Jackson’s character pondering licking an ape’s genitals.  It’s a laugh-out-loud moment for sure, but like much of the humor in this, it seems sprinkled on top after the fact rather than developing naturally within the story itself.  The movie seems to be afraid it’s being too serious sometimes, and stretching to remedy that.

Listen, David Yates is a great director.  He knocked those Harry Potter films out of the park, but it’s like his grip on the reins slipped once things shifted to Africa.  Tone aside, once the eagerly awaited action started to kick into high gear, other cracks started to appear.  I wouldn’t say the action is bad, it just felt incomplete at times.  There is what I can only describe as an abruptness to what transpires.  This becomes most apparent in a scene between Tarzan and Mbonga.  We essentially stumble into and out of this much anticipated encounter so unexpectedly, it’s pretty much over and done with before we even realize what happened.  This showdown was one of the driving forces of the story, but passes by in a blink.

And what was up with those circular pans?  If you don’t know what I mean, it’s when the camera rotates around a fixed point like a person or object.  There was some suspect use of the camera here and there, but those pans took the cake.  There was a scene where Tarzan and his friends are having a peaceful conversation in the middle of a village and that camera was going like a tilt-a-whirl at your local carnival.  It damn near gave me motion sickness.  It doesn’t happen too often, but it happens enough for one to take notice, and that is never a good thing.

Now, I know I seem to be giving the movie a slogging here, but it wasn’t as bad as I might be making it out to be.  I’m being picky because I really wanted this to be “THE” Tarzan movie.

As I mentioned before, they have assembled a fantastic cast here.  Alexander Skarsgard has the physical aspects of Tarzan down pat, both in body and movement.  He is not just a man, but a man raised as an animal.  Time is taken to show that all those years spent with the apes had an effect on the body as well as the mind, and Skarsgard is very effective at showing us that.  There is a great moment with a group of children in England where the youngsters notice how he is not quite the same as other men, and he explains to them the why and how.  It’s the more personal moments like this where Skarsgard really shines.  And when it comes time to swing and kick butt, he is a force to be reckoned with.  I just wish the action scenes had been handled better.  There were hints of greatness to come in many scenes that unfortunately didn’t.  They were good, but could have been so much better.

Samuel L. Jackson is essentially playing Samuel L. Jackson, and that is not necessarily a bad thing.  His role in this is huge, making the movie almost more a buddy picture than a Tarzan flick.  Most of the humor here falls to him, and he does make us laugh a lot, but this is a “Tarzan of the Jungle” movie, not a “Tarzan and George of the Jungle” movie.  As wonderful as he and his performance are, they often just seemed out of place, taking up valuable Tarzan time.

Christoph Waltz and Djimon Hounsou as the antagonists do a bang-up job, but their characters are ones we have seen many times before.  They don’t bring anything new to the table, but they are damn fine actors and that means a lot.  Less capable performers would have made these characters much more forgettable, and they are to be commended for elevating the material they were given to work with.

And what of Miss Robbie?  Well, she damn near stole this movie from her heavyweight co-stars.  There’s a reason she is the IT girl in Hollywood right now.  Her performance as Jane was the standout here.  She is just as smart and tough as her hubby from beginning to end, and is a far cry from the damsel-in-distress that usually defined the role in previous outings.  She spends much of the movie fighting her own battles, and she doesn’t need Tarzan to come swooping in at the last minute.  If the filmmakers had gone that route, it would have been a huge disservice to the character, the actress, and the story.  Kudos to all involved for giving us the best Jane ever.  She’s a badass.

The cinematography by Henry Braham is wonderful, as he and Yates give us an Africa to truly ooh and aah over.  The CGI used to bring the animals to life is very good, and even though there were moments where it was noticeable, it never took me out of the movie.  And as long as we’re talking about the animals, I gotta say that some of the best moments in this were when Tarzan interacted with his four-legged friends.  They were always touching and gorgeously shot.  This was when I most felt I was watching a Tarzan movie.  Very nicely done.

Overall, there is a lot to love here.  Unfortunately, because of the shifting tones, some dodgy camerawork, a bit of heavy-handedness with the slavery aspect of the story, and the choppy action scenes, the overall experience suffers to a degree.  I did like this film, but I pine for what could have been.  I really got the feeling that a lot of what was filmed ended up on the cutting room floor.  Disjointed is the best word I can come up with to describe it.  Yates was coming off the much longer Potter films when he decided to take on this project, and I wonder if he had been forced to keep this project to a shorter running time.  That would definitely explain the abruptness and incompleteness to scenes I mentioned before.  Maybe a more fleshed out and complete version awaits us down the road with the eventual DVD and Blu-ray release. I certainly hope so. 

Regardless, this one is still worth swinging into your nearest theater to see.