Edgar Rice Burroughs is reduced to softcore porn. Instead of this being a story about a man who was raised by apes, it's a story about the sexual awakening of Jane, and it's a ludicrously awful awakening. "Tarzan the Ape Man" is so awful that it does achieve Ed Wood/Showgirls levels of so-bad-it's-good, which makes this film essential viewing for fans of bad cinema. Pretty, but talentless Bo Derek plays Jane. High points of camp include Tarzan pawing at Jane in a very odd early courtship scene. Aother scene has Tarzan rescuing Jane from a tribe of natives who roughly wash her and then cover her in mud, which I'm assuming director John Derek (Bo's husband) meant to be erotic. Oh, and over the end credits, Bo is pawed by a real ape, an orangutan, which I'm hoping was some sort of nod to the 70s/80s ape cycle of comedies (i.e "Every Which Way But Loose," "Going Ape," "BJ and the Bear," etc.). These scenes were all likely intended to be titillating, but similarly to "Showgirl," they are anything but. Overall, "Tarzan the Ape Man" is about as bad a film as can be made (I hope Richard Harris was paid handsomely for appearing),but it's sooooooooo bad, that it's absolutely worth watching, which is why I suppose Turner Classic Movies chose to air this unintentional laugh riot. FUN FACT! United Artists was sued by the Edgar Rice Burroughs estate over the film.

I appreciate John Derek's "Tarzan the Ape Man" (1981) because it's so unique and it does inspire the awe of nature, whether scenic, animal, human or romantic. The plot of the film focuses on Jane Parker (Bo Derek),who goes to remotest Africa in search of her explorer father, James Parker (Richard Harris). She joins his party (which includes John Phillip Law) and they climb to the top of a mysterious escarpment whereupon they discover a wild white man, Tarzan (Miles O'Keeffe). Meanwhile the aborigines don't take too kindly to their encroachment.

The opening MGM emblem tips off that the film shouldn't be taken too seriously: instead of the lion's roar we get Tarzan's famous jungle yell. The movie is generally serious, but in a comic-book sort of way. There's a nice sense of awe as the party traverses through the wilderness (it was shot in Sri Lanka and the island of Seychelles, 1500 miles SW of Sri Lanka),particularly when they discover the great escarpment and, then, the fictitious inland sea.

The animals are great as well, particularly the magnificent lion, the friendly elephant who scoops up Tarzan's body and the playful chimps & orangutan. By the way, the Asian elephant and orangutan present an obvious plot hole since they're not native to Africa. Not to mention James' native babe, Africa (Akushula Selayah),since she's clearly of East Indian stock (although he might've picked her up on a different expedition). Also, the muscular dude who plays the "Ivory King" (Steve Strong) is obviously a white dude painted black. Speaking of the Ivory King, Steve Strong really hams it up with bad acting befitting of a gym rat and why does it take so long to simply wake him up?

The second act is kind of boring. It consists mostly of Jane and Tarzan getting to know each other in the jungle. There's a beauty and innocence to the scenes, even a sense of awe, but they're probably too long for the average viewer. Still, the film celebrates this aspect of the human experience much as the Song of Songs in the Bible celebrates the consummation of a man & woman with overtly erotic language (read it and see for yourself).

"Tarzan the Ape Man" is reminiscent of 1976's "King Kong" in tone. Remember the sense of awe of that film coupled with the comic booky material? Remember when Kong bathed Dwan via the waterfall and gazes on in wonder? Remember the stretched-out dramatics? This is what you get with "Tarzan the Ape Man". It's an adventure film with a lot of drama and little conventional action. When the action comes -- Tarzan vs. a huge snake and Tarzan vs. the Ivory King -- it's presented in slow-motion, which is strange and hardly thrilling. And, yet, it sets the film apart. "Tarzan the Ape Man" takes its time in telling its story; by contrast, 1998's "Tarzan and the Lost City" hurriedly jumps from one sequence to the next with hardly any room to breath. They're both Tarzan films but from two completely different approaches. I just viewed them both back-to-back and it's an interesting comparison.

Of course, "Tarzan the Ape Man" is a showcase for Bo Derek. She's a beautiful woman both inside and out, but she's not a perfect "10" in my opinion. Her physicality is indeed statuesque, but her butt is too flat and her thighs too skinny (sorry if that sounds crude; I'm just being honest).

Miles O'Keeffe LOOKS great as Tarzan, but that's it. He has zero dialog beyond Tarzan's patented yell and, worse, zero depth as a character, except that he's benign and heroic. This is disappointing because Burroughs' books presented him as highly intelligent and even a type of Yahweh (the LORD),as in "the Lord of the jungle". But the film focuses on Tarzan when he is first discovered by Europeans (when he knew how to read via kid's books, but not yet how to speak English),so this can be forgiven.

One aspect of the film is outstanding and that's Tarzan's kinship with the various animals. An excellent example is the innocent playfulness of Tarzan, Jane and the orangutan in the closing scene.

Also, Richard Harris is worthy of note because he gives the role all his heart and is convincing. Despite his constant (and loud) blathering he does have some interesting insights -- like the importance of living life to its fullest and the humility to turn to God when he's totally spent (and it works!). In other words, the film isn't just mindless adventure; it features some gems to chew on.

"Tarzan the Ape Man" was a modest hit in 1981 but, surprisingly, there was no sequel. It would've been interesting to see O'Keeffe's Tarzan develop as a character and his relationship with Jane. But maybe John and Bo accomplished everything they intended to with this film and found the idea of a sequel superfluous.

BOTTOM LINE: "Tarzan the Ape Man" is a unique Tarzan film and worth it for the sense of awe -- the marvels of nature, the amazement of animals, the beauty of the (fit) human form and the wonder of (true) sexuality.

The film runs 107 minutes.

GRADE: B-

Surely one of the most ill-advised remakes of a classic in film history – especially since the promise of its tag-line, “The most beautiful woman of our time in the most erotic adventure of all time”, isn’t even properly exploited! Although this film was regularly shown on TV in my neck of the woods since my childhood days, its notoriety (for awfulness not erotic content, mind you) kept me away from it until now – and I only relented because I have recently enjoyed Bo Derek’s previous film, 10 (1979),and have been watching a lot of fantasy stuff as well over the Christmas period.

Lead actress/producer Bo Derek is rather ridiculous playing the schoolgirl-ish sexual innocent (witness the inept banana scene) and, as was to be expected, she is made to get her clothes off a few times but, as welcome as these scenes were, she came off as far more sensual in 10 than she does here; Richard Harris, then, chews the scenery incessantly as Jane’s obsessed explorer father, but John Philip Law barely registers as his aide who meekly shows some initial interest in Jane herself; newcomer Miles O’Keeffe has the title role and he only makes his entrance 45 minutes into the movie, is completely silent throughout except for his famous yodel (which is probably lifted from Johnny Weissmuller anyway!) and, furthermore, is as inexpressive as one of the trees he dangles from at regular intervals throughout the film’s second half!; for the record, he later starred in two ATOR movies (or would-be CONAN imitators) for Joe D’Amato and the King Arthur-era set, SWORD OF THE VALIANT (1984).

When still an actor, director John Derek (who also serves as his own cinematographer here) had worked with some good film-makers (Cecil B. De Mille, William Dieterle and Robert Rossen) and a few great ones (Otto Preminger, Nicholas Ray and Don Siegel) but he clearly learned zilch from them as his direction of this one is a major liability: appallingly pretentious at times (witness the perfectly horrid python attack sequence) with a senseless overuse of the slow motion technique and cheesy transitions; this was Derek’s seventh film as a director (and his second of four with wife Bo) and, eventually, he would only get to make two more.

The film’s utter failure only needs to be gauged by the fact that the Tarzan legend was tackled once more on film – in GREYSTOKE: THE LEGEND OF TARZAN, LORD OF THE APES (which, surprisingly enough, I haven’t watched myself yet) – a mere three years later!! Nominated for six Razzie Awards (including John Derek, Richard Harris and Miles O’Keeffe) and winning one for Bo Derek herself, TARZAN, THE APE MAN was co-written by Gary Goddard, the future director of another highly anticipated but ultimately disappointing transposition to the silver screen of a (this time animated) heroic figure, MASTER OF THE UNIVERSE (1987) which I will be revisiting presently as well (yay)! Despite a charming closing credit sequence showing Tarzan and Jane playing with around with an orang-utan and a music score that is not half bad actually and quite rousing on occasion, any belated good intentions are defeated by an extremely silly climax involving natives painting Bo completely white and, fatally, John Derek’s clear disinterest in the character of Tarzan himself which makes him come off as an unimportant supporting character in his own self-titled movie!!