I haven't seen all the Tarzan films, so I can't say if this is the best, but I've seen enough to know that it is one of the better ones. For a start it does away with all these ludicrously elaborate adventure plots that curse the Jock Mahoney and Gordon Scott Tarzan entries, and returns to the basis of the original E.R.Burroughs book, focusing on the life of a shipwrecked child who grows up among apes and begins to act and eat like them.
In the second half of the picture, Tarzan is all grown up (as personified by Christopher Lambert, who is just right for this role) and he is found living with the apes by some European explorers. They bring him back to Victorian England, where he meets his real family and is educated to join the "civilised" society where he should have grown up if he hadn't been shipwrecked all those years ago. In an ironic touch, he realises that "civilised" people are actually more barbaric than his ape family, and in the end he returns to where he truly belongs.
The audiences seem divided over this one. Some love it, others hate it. My view is that it is mainly a very good film, nicely performed and photographed, with an interesting and mostly convincing script. I agree with other reviewers who have pointed out that certain scenes are a touch unintentionally funny, but aside from that I rank this film quite highly.
In the second half of the picture, Tarzan is all grown up (as personified by Christopher Lambert, who is just right for this role) and he is found living with the apes by some European explorers. They bring him back to Victorian England, where he meets his real family and is educated to join the "civilised" society where he should have grown up if he hadn't been shipwrecked all those years ago. In an ironic touch, he realises that "civilised" people are actually more barbaric than his ape family, and in the end he returns to where he truly belongs.
The audiences seem divided over this one. Some love it, others hate it. My view is that it is mainly a very good film, nicely performed and photographed, with an interesting and mostly convincing script. I agree with other reviewers who have pointed out that certain scenes are a touch unintentionally funny, but aside from that I rank this film quite highly.