THE TARZAN VAULT COLLECTION (1918-1935)
TARZAN OF THE APES (1918) - ADVENTURES OF TARZAN (1921) - NEW ADVENTURES OF TARZAN (1935)
Label: The Film Detective
Region Code: Region-Free
Rating: Unrated
Audio: English DTS-HD MA 2.0 Dual-Mono, Dolby Digital 2.0 Dual-Mono with Optional English Subtitles
Video: 1080p HD Fullscreen (1.37:1)
I cannot say that I was ever a real big fan of the Edgar Rice Burroughs stories of the vine-swinging ape-man Tarzan, nor of the various comic and film adaptations, they just never appealed to me as a kid, and if I am honest, they don't much appeal to be now. I do remember seeing the Johnny Weissmuller films on WPIX in my youth with that distinctive, ululating call of his, but they were always just on in the background and didn't capture my imagination the way the Universal Shock Theater TV flicks did, that whole "Me Tarzan, You Jane" schtick just seemed so dated and weird. I can honestly say that Tarzan didn't really make a dent in my pop-culture psyche until I saw Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes (1984) starring Christopher Lambert (Highlander) at the theater when I was about 12 years-old; maybe because it was a more contemporary (non B&W) film with modern production values, and maybe because it featured adolescent Tarzan pissing on the head of an ape - it was probably a bit of both, but definitely the latter! With that said, I still quite like the '84 version of the story and it's pretty much where my love for the character started and stopped. I say stopped because until today there has not been a single Tarzan property since '84 that I have watched, so I guess I liked that film and not necessarily the character.
Curiously, that brings us to The Tarzan Vault Collection 3-disc set from The Film Detective, collecting the very first filmic adaptation of the character with the silent films Tarzan of the Apes (1918), and it's serialized sequel Adventures of Tarzan (1921), both starring Elmo Lincoln as the (sort of) vine-swinging ape-man, and the talkie serial The New Adventures of Tarzan (1935) starring former Olympic shotput champion Herman Brix.
TARZAN OF THE APES (1918)
Duration: 65 Minutes
Director: Scott Sidney
Cast: Elmo Lincoln, Enid Markey, George B. French, Gordon Griffith
Tarzan of the Apes (1912) has the distinction of being the first filmic adaptation of Edgar Rice Burroughs serialized Tarzan stories, and it seems fairly faithful to the source material, though I am no expert, but it's set in 1888 with Lord Greystoke (True Boardman) and his wife Lady Greystoke (Kathleen Kirkham) bound for Africa by steamboat when a mutiny break out onboard. In the aftermath they are marooned in the coastal jungles of Africa where they make a jungle-hut home for themselves and eventually give birth to a son. The mom dies soon after, followed by her husband who is killed by a menacing dominant male ape named Kerchak. The baby is then adopted and raised by the she-ape Kala, and in time he becomes the heir apparent to King Kerchak - crowned Tarzan, King of the Apes. At some point a new group of people arrive on the island, including love-interest Jane (Enid Markey) and Tarzan (Elmo Lincoln) is returned to his ancestral home to be the new Lord Greystoke, but chooses the way of the wild over civilization, returning to the jungle. Having only seen the '84 Greystoke previously I was surprised how similar the pair of films are, both tracking quite similarly. Elmo Lincoln's Tarzan is a barrel-chested strongman sort, a lot different than the image I had in my head, but he pulls it off, he just looks more like a wrestler than a King of the Apes. The silent film is a bit clunky at times but all the components of the source material is there, and I have to say my favorite part of this version is the kid who plays young Tarzan, Gordon Griffith, he was terrific!
ADVENTURES OF TARZAN (1921)
Duration: 67 Minutes
Director: Robert F. Hill
Cast: Elmo Lincoln, Louise Lorraine, Scott Pembroke, Frank Whitson, Lillian Worth
In the serialized sequel Adventures of Tarzan (1918), again starring Elmo Lincoln, Tarzan first rescues his lady-love Jane (Louise Lorraine) from Arab slave-traders who like everyone who's not an ape, has somehow been marooned in the coastal jungles of Africa, then having to rescue her again from being sacrificed by the evil yet seductive Queen La of Opar (Lillian Worth), only to then have to rescue her from the new Lord Greystoke, who kidnaps her to get a map to the hidden city she was just rescued from! You can tell this is a serialized film series that's been cut to shreds into a feature-length film, it's not exactly elegant in it's editing or stitching together of disparate storylines. This was probably my least favorite of the Tarzan stuff I have seen thus far, Lincoln doesn't seem to be too into any of it (this was his last turn as Tarzan it turns out).
THE NEW ADVENTURES OF TARZAN (1935)
Duration: 255 Minutes
Director: Edward Kull
Cast: Herman Brix, Ula Holt, Ashton Dearholt, Frank Baker, Lewis Sargent
In 1935, the public was still ape-crazy for the vine-swinging nobleman, and in this 12-part serial 1928 Olympian shot-putter Herman Brix (aka Bruce Bennet, The Alligator People) slips into the loin cloth to portray Tarzan. This time out Tarzan travels from his adopted African home to the jungles of Guatemala to rescue his friend, Lt. d'Arnot, whose plane crashed there, and Tarzan ends up searching for a priceless Guatemalan priceless known as The Green Goddess. The first chapter of this serialized film series is a feature length self-contained (more or less) feature, with the subsequent eleven entries ranging from 15-20 minutes in length. Slightly better shot that the last entry and featuring some actual jungle locations instead of stage-sets and Louisiana swampland this looks improved but still fairly clunky. I'm no Tarzan serial expert and couldn't tell you if these are the complete serials uncut but what we get is 355-minutes of Brix doing his best ape-man stuff, he's quite an athletic looking guy and better suits the role than Elmo Lincoln in my opinion. There's no Jane this time around, but we do get Ula (Ula Holt), a adventurer/spy - her role can be slightly confusing, apparently there was a lot of rewriting during the filming, and she was the soon-to-be wife of producer Ashton Dearholt, and this is her only credited screen role from what I can tell. Another element I dig is the non-traditional Tarzan call at the start of each film, it's quite different from the Weissmuller incarnation.
Audio/Video: The three Tarzan features arrives on 3-disc region-free Blu-ray with the two silent film on the first disc and the New Adventures of Tarzan serials spread across disc two and three. This is advertised as being sourced from original 35mm archival elements, presented in 1080p HD in the original 1.37:1 fullscreen aspect ratio. The sources show quite a few limitations, there in rough shape with obvious wear and tear, scratches, blurring, warping, jutter, and general instability, but all things considered they're quite watchable. The first two films are silent but have a orchestral soundtrack accompaniment with the third film being a "talkie", audio for all three comes by way of uncompressed English DTS-HD MA 2.0 dual mono with optional English subtitles. The DTS-HD doesn't give this track much of a bump over the Dolby option, it's a thin and shabby sounding on all three films, and while it's never a chore to discern but it's never a treat, either.
The Film Detective team-up with Ballyhoo Motion Pictures to produce an hour of new featurettes for this release. First up is the 20-min Law of the Jungle: The Cinematic Adventures of Herman Brix, an archival interview with the film star, aka Bruce Bennett that is newly edited. In it the athlete turned actor talks about his early athletic achievements before breaking into acting via his friendship with silent era star Douglas Fairbank, and how he was initially cast by Burrough's himself in an earlier Tarzan film before having to bow out after a serious injury on the football picture Touchdown! (1939), with the role going to Johnny Weissmuller, before finally getting a vine to swing on with The New Adventures 0f Tarzan (1935), The old time fondly recalls shooting the serial in Guadalajara over three months, the change of directors, relying more on the locations available more so than the script, and lighting the dark interiors of caves with reflected light from mirrors. He also gets into how MGM beat them to the punch getting a Tarzan flick to the theaters, and burying upon it's release by making sure no MGM owned theaters would show it. He also gets into subsequently being typecast as the Tarzan-type and changing his name to Bruce Bennet so that he could get more work, which lead to contract work with Warner Bros. and higher profiles gigs like Mildred Pierce and The Treasure of the Sierra Madre. He also notes working with Bela Lugosi on the Shadow of Chinatown serial and how Lugosi learned his lines, a difficult horse on The Lone Ranger, and working with Joan Crawford, whom he says was simply a "bitch" off-set.
Drawn to the Jungle: The Early History of Tarzan in Comics with author/writer Donald F. Glut who recounts his early lobe of Tarzan comics, especially those with dinosaurs, and noting the different styles of various Tarzan comics through the years, and later in life getting the opportunity to write Tarzan comics with artist/storyteller Russ Manning, which lead to a regular run for Gold Key Comics, including some crossovers with Tarzan encountering Buffalo Bill and King Kong! It's a great featurette with some fantastic artwork on display.
Swinging into Action: The Early Adventures of Tarzan is a 20-minute piece featuring author/filmmaker C. Courtney Joyner and producer/film historian Bruce Scivally and literary historian Richard Heft who give an appreciation of Edgar Rice Burroughs source material and how Tarzan was his first taste of success, getting into the sad story of how actor Elmo Lincoln stabbed to death a toothless, drugged-up lion on the set of Tarzan of the Apes, the way non-white races are portrayed in the films which is not good but was a product of it's era, as well as how MGM moved away from the source material quite a bit, and noting the athletic backgrounds of the actors who portrayed Tarzan.
We also get a fully illustrated 26-page booklet insert with three original essays by authors Don Stradley and Jennifer Churchill exploring Elmo Lincoln's career which includes some off marketing hype and how his career waned and he was kind of the butt of a lot of jokes. Another essay explores the complicated history of the character and the problematic ideas about race of author Burroughs, and the doomed production and history of The New Adventures of Tarzan, including some salacious story about author Burroughs and producer Ashton Dearholt involving the swapping of lovers! We also get Audio Commentary track for The Adventures of Tarzan and The New Adventures of Tarzan by journalist/historian Ed Hulse that is quite thorough and packed with super well-researched, if it's knowable he seems to know it, and I appreciated the dense commentary.
The three disc set arrives in a large keepcase with a flipper tray that holds the three discs, it's a bit too large for it's own good but maybe that's to house the big booklet that accompanies it, otherwise this could have been housed in a standard keepcase with a flipper tray I think.
Special Features:
- Full-color 26-page booklet insert includes three original essays by authors Don Stradley and Jennifer Churchill
- Original featurette, Drawn to the Jungle: The Early History of Tarzan in Comics, by Ballyhoo Motion Pictures (11 min)
- Full-length commentary track for The Adventures of Tarzan and The New Adventures of Tarzan by award-winning journalist/historian, Ed Hulse
- Original feature production, Swinging into Action: The Early Adventures of Tarzan on Film by Ballyhoo Motion Pictures (20 min)
- Law of the Jungle: The Cinematic Adventures of Herman Brix, a preserved interview with the film star, aka Bruce Bennett (28 min)
This set didn't exactly turn me around on Tarzan, but it did give me a deeper appreciation for the franchise, at least those represented on this set, and the new extras are pretty terrific, and I suspect that they'd be exponentially better the more "into" Tarzan you are. The Film Detective have been doing great work preserving obscure, cult and minor classic cinema, and they did the same for the early Tarzan films here. I wish there was more restoration afforded these silent and early talkie adventure tales but just having them on disc with quality extras is quite a treat.
Screenshots from The Film Detective Blu-ray Set:
TARZAN OF THE APES (1918)
ADVENTURES OF TARZAN (1921)
NEW ADVENTURES OF TARZAN (1935)
Extras:
