The New Adventures of Tarzan

MGM can’t have been happy to discover that Tarzan author Edgar Rice Burroughs was embarking on a film series of his own — MGM’s rights to the franchise were not exclusive. With two features released, and taking a break before a third, MGM worried as Burroughs’ producer Ashton Dearholt’s movie expedition sailed to Guatemala to film what would become a 12-chapter serial: The New Adventures of Tarzan.

Dearholt had mostly worked in westerns but had ambitious plans to build his partnership with Burroughs into a big studio. He had filmed in Guatemala before, bringing back a girlfriend; when his wife left him he cast his new love in the serial’s main role. This Tarzan movie has no Jane. It also has no Cheeta, but a chimp named Nkima, as in the original books.

The serial is no classic, but its choice of Tarzans is very impressive. It is said that Douglas Fairbanks recommended the 6 foot, 2 inch Herman Brix for the role, and Brix certainly has the physique. The former Olympic shot-putter had played numerous bits uncredited, making this starring picture his first with his name on the screen. Brix had been in consideration for the MGM Tarzan film, but had to drop out due to an injury sustained filming a football scene for a Paramount picture, Touchdown (1931). He also didn’t make the cut for the ’32 Olympics, which had to be a disappointment. Then came this job offer from a tiny independent company that would be filming far away in central America.

The story begins in Africa. As per the books, Tarzan is identified as Lord Greystoke; he yodels when swinging through the trees, but outside the jungle he wears civilized clothing and speaks plain American English. Tarzan is invited to join a safari to recover a Mayan artifact that contains a formula for a new explosive, and keep it from evildoers. The adventurers are unaffiliated do-gooders: Major Martling (Frank Baker), his daughter Alice (Dale Walsh), and her fiancé Gordon Hamilton (Harry Ernest). Tarzan agrees to guide them, because a friend of his disappeared in an earlier expedition into darkest Guatemala. Tarzan brings Nkima with him, and the ‘flunky’ George (Lewis Sargent) comes along as well. Both Nkima and George provide comedy relief.

But the expedition is shadowed by the evil Raglan (Don Costello aka producer Dearholt), who of course has other plans for the explosive formula. Also on the trail from Africa to Guatemala is an ‘adventuress’ named Ula Vale (Ula Holt). Her motives are hazy … she says she wants to stop Raglan, but is also in search of her lost fiancé, who disappeared along with Tarzan’s friend. Ula follows Martling’s group secretly as well … the reason for that is a bit hazy.

It’s a strange serial, to say the least. The first chapter is a full hour in duration, and the other 11 are around 15 minutes each. The pace is uneven. Tarzan takes breaks to hobnob with Nkima, sometimes when his safari friends are in trouble. The daring Ula Vale needs to be rescued several times, as does the helpless Alice. Some chapters use cliffhangers involving fights, but others see safari members in peril: about to be sacrificed on an altar, tortured, burned alive, fed to alligators, or lowered into pits with wild jungle cats.

Herman Brix appears to do most of his own stunts; the only time we’re sure he’s replaced is when Tarzan wrestles live lions. He’s very impressive when jumping around in trees, leaping for hanging vines, and thrashing himself through the brush. He does all of this in only his loincloth, with apparently nothing on his feet. The camera direction is undistinguished, and some action is marred by clunky editing, but Brix is always doing something that could easily get him seriously injured. For some river rescues he and Ula swim in a dangerous-looking torrent.

Brix must have realized that his chances for stardom would increase if he took chances. Tarzan’s physical feats resulted in an injury to a foot, a gash on his knee and a serious bite from the &%@*! Chimpanzee. Amoebic dysentery wiped him out as well. He returned to Los Angeles in bad shape, still sick and weighing 30 pounds less. Yet he looks great throughout the show.

Are you Green or are you Lost?  Make up your mind. 

As in any serial, the action is a redundant series of captures and escapes, with the artifact and its formula changing hands multiple times. Mayan warriors called ‘monsters’ guard the artifact, which they call ‘The Green Goddess,’ although the inter-title text refers to it as ‘The Lost Goddess.’ It’s a tiny stone obelisk, about 25 inches tall, just heavy enough to be difficult to lug around. Ragland keeps stealing Martling’s notebook, that contains a code for opening a secret compartment in the stone Goddess. Why an ancient relic would have a secret compartment escapes us, as does why anyone would choose such a thing as a place to hide a chemical formula. Is it written in Old Mayan?

Martling keeps asking the goofy George why he’s toting a big box around.  ↑  We eventually find out that the box contains a machine gun, which George happily uses to massacre perhaps 50 angry Mayans. Don’t worry, they’re all Pagan idolaters, so the Production Code won’t mind.

The production doesn’t sound well-planned. The small crew had to contend with terrible weather and impassable roads. The money ran out almost immediately, forcing Dearholt to ask Burroughs for more money. We’re told that much of the original story and relationships were abandoned before filming. In the last chapter of the shooting script, the ‘adventuress’ Ula Vale was to be revealed to be a government agent. The original chapter title  ‘Operative 17’  was retained even after that story point was dropped — had the titles already been filmed and paid for?

The Mayan tribe turns out to be a death cult ruled by the Savage Queen Maya — who can’t make herself sacrifice the handsome Tarz Baby. The ‘Dead City’ of the Mayans is of course located in Central America, but some of the animals encountered are African, especially a lion that Tarzan must fight … or Tarzan’s stand-in, lion tamer Mel Koontz. The lion was the same animal that roared for MGM’s main logo, a touch that Louis B. Mayer can’t have appreciated. One of the big cat trainers, Jackie Gentry, also played the role of Queen Maya. With such a small production way out on location, it makes sense that crew and the producer would double as actors.

Tarzan: Lord of the Non Sequiturs. 

About halfway through the serial, Martling theorizes that the Mayan Green Goddess artifact came originally from an island off Africa (???).  Tarzan looks forward to returning to his ‘stomping grounds’ to solve the mystery. But the archeological motive is dropped entirely, in favor of securing the explosive formula. The last chapter takes place in England, at an incongruous party where Lord Graystoke and his guests are dressed as gypsies. We assume that Western Costume didn’t accidentally ship the wrong costumes to the location, but, really …

Although the serial benefits from a few shots of Guatemalan ruins, the Mayan tribesmen are played by ordinary locals with painted faces. Many exteriors appear to have been filmed back in Southern California, the main clue for that being the dry hills and big Eucalyptus trees common to Culver City and Griffith Park.

The movie is also padded with stock footage; in addition to cutaways to animals, we suspect that most of a storm at sea was purchased from a stock library. Some handsome but worn-looking animations of stormy skies look as if they came from a silent movie. We also wonder if the more elaborate shots of the Mayan ‘great hall’ could cribbed from some older movie. Those shots take a slight down-turn in quality.

The cliff hanger endings use plenty of repeated footage. Instead of clearing up loose ends in the storyline, the final chapter is entirely made of recap-repeats, as a gypsy fortune teller relates the high points of the dangerous expedition to the Dead City.

In a weird turn of events, an unbilled supporting role in the movie was given to General Jorge Ubico — then the President of Guatemala. Ubico’s  Wikipedia entry depicts him as an oppressive military dictator who backed local oligarchs and sold out to the United Fruit Country. He also compared himself to Adolf Hitler. He must have been one vain despot, envisioning himself as a movie actor. Ubico plays Tarzan’s ‘very best friend.’  Was this arrangement Ashton Dearholt’s idea, or did the movie-crazy General lean on the production to ‘make him a star?’

The show is basically for the committed Tarzan fans. The direction is clunky but sincere, and nothing approaches the production values of the MGM series, yet we think Herman Brix / Bruce Bennett does a terrific job. It is refreshing to see Tarzan traveling to rescue his friend by boat, dressed as an Englishman. That’s long before Christopher Lambert donned English finery in  Greystoke, the Legend of Tarzan. This movie’s hero plays a hand of bridge on the boat, while the sinister Raglan and the maybe-good Ula Vale watch from the sidelines.

According to author Scott Tracy Griffin, a shortened feature version of The New Adventures of Tarzan was prepared for release two years later: Tarzan and the Green Goddess. It reportedly had unique footage. The full serial on Film Masters’ disc is credited to ‘Burroughs-Tarzan Enterprises,’ the original producing company. Louis B. Mayer and MGM couldn’t stop Burroughs from distributing a competing Tarzan picture, so they leaned on exhibitors across the country, threatening to withhold MGM product from ‘disloyal’ customers. Later in 1935, Burroughs formed a new company under a tough salesman, who apparently broke through the blockade — for a huge cut of the proceeeds. The movie reportedly made back its cost in Europe, but Aston Dearholt’s film career came to a stop.

Upon his return to Hollywood Herman Brix found work mostly in lower-tier westerns and serials. In 1939 he started anew under his new name, Bruce Bennett. It took years to graduate from small parts, but Bennett became a much respected actor. He ended up in a number of respected classics:  Sahara,  Mildred Pierce,  The Man I Love and  The Treasure of Sierra Madre.

Tarzan fans will likely consider Film Masters’ disc a positive step forward, at least until a perfect original negative surfaces somewhere. It’s been over a year since the Warner Archive Collection put out the  first Weissmuller Tarzan on Blu-ray; we’re hoping they continue the series with the pre-Code classic  Tarzan and His Mate. It’s a triple-threat wonder movie: racially crude, oversexed and ultra-violent.