The end was near for Johnny Weissmuller’s adventures in backlot and soundstage jungles with 1955’s Jungle Moon Men, one of three films in which he played a character named, in fact, “Johnny Weissmuller.” This time around, Johnny accompanies an author (Jean Byron), nice guy Bob Prentice (William Henry), and shady guide Mark Santo (Myron Healey) …
Read the full post →“<em>Jungle Moon Men</em> (Columbia, 1955)”
Johnny stars as a character named Johnny Weissmuller rather than Jungle Jim in the first of three such pictures made after the last of the Jungle Jim movies, are well-nigh indistinguishable save for new names for the protagonist and the chimp. This time around, Johnny investigates reports of thefts of cobalt from a uomine operated …
Read the full post →“<em>Cannibal Attack</em> (Columbia, 1954)”
A diamond smuggler works with one tribe to war against another tribe and thereby gain unfettered access to the diamond mine whose owners he has killed. It’s up to Jungle Jim (Johnny Weissmuller), working with Inspector Bernard (Richard Stapley), and with the dubious assistance of the chimp Tamba, to put an end to the scheme …
Read the full post →“<em>Jungle Man-Eaters</em> (Columbia, 1954)”
Middling entry in the Jungle Jim series is another with the air of the fantastic, as mad scientists testing animals as part of germ warfare research intrude into the lands of a giant apeman that begins a rampage. Enjoyable for what it is, but not the place to start with the films. Mildly recommended. Otto …
Bad guys use attacks, purportedly by headhunters, to get their ally, whom the ringleader has rescued from a murder conviction, into power over a native tribe so that he can sign away the tribe’s mineral rights and the villains can exploit the oil that is there. Jungle Jim (Johnny Weissmuller) works with a young military …
Read the full post →“<em>Valley of Head Hunters</em> (Columbia, 1955)”
The Cold War looms large in 1953’s Savage Mutiny, as Jungle Jim (Johnny Weissmuller) undertakes to persuade a tribe to move to permit atomic testing, while enemy agents aim to trick the tribe into staying put and suffering the adverse effects of the radiation from the tests. The machinations of the foreign spies and the …
Read the full post →“<em>Savage Mutiny</em> (Columbia, 1953)”
While a researcher investigates reports of a tribe worshipping a tiger (trying learn whether this is true, and if so why, as tigers are not native to Africa), a government agent looks for a Nazi war criminal who holds the secret to some stolen art. Add in some crooks also after the art and a …
Read the full post →“<em>Voodoo Tiger</em> (Columbia, 1952)”
Ivory is the aim of the bad guys in this Jungle Jim outing, in which the man of few words is sought out by an anthropologist hoping he will guide her to the forbidden Land of the Giants, whose territory also is the target of those after the elephants as well. The “giants” don’t seem …
Read the full post →“<em>Jungle Jim in the Forbidden Land</em> (Columbia, 1952)”
