Tarzan's Desert Mystery (1943)

Stylish but barely mediocre overall

Some things I liked some I did not.

Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

Story: It's very simple but honestly that is fine.

No, I didn't misspell Tarzan's Jane, who isn't in this film, except in an indirect way. Actually, Jayne is a stallion(not a mare), perhaps so named in memory of Jane? Supposedly, Jayne is wild, but he didn't act so in Tarzan's presence, allowing Boy to ride him to the next oasis, and playing a significant role in the future adventures of Tarzan's group, while they are crossing the desert, to the 'lost' jungle, where they hope to find a plant with anti-'fever'(probably malaria) activity. They hope to send some to Jane, in a London hospital, to treat soldiers suffering from malaria.(As a historical note, at the release time of this movie, the Japanese controlled Java, where nearly all the world's commercial supply of quinine was produced. Also, the Germans controlled The Netherlands, where the crude quinine was purified and packaged for use. Thus, the Allies were desperate for some other source of antimalarial. Just how Tarzan was expected to recognize this rare plant is not explained........Nancy Kelly, as Connie Bryce, more or less takes the place of Jane, after she is encountered at an oasis.( Just what she was doing, as a side show magician, in the middle of the Sahara desert is never explained!). When Tarzan gets to the oasis, he mistakenly thinks her Arab companions are trying to saw her in half. He chases them and her camels away, to the displeasure of Connie. Before Tarzan arrived, she had arranged with Sheik Amir to carry a secret message to Prince Selim, son of Sheik Abdul El Khim. The message is hidden in a bracelet that Connie wears. Prince Selim later discovers that it tells of a plot by 2 German agents: Karl Straeder, and Paul Hendrix, to stir up some tribesmen into a rebellion. The Germans want to prevent Prince Selim from receiving or acting upon the message(How do they know there is such a message and what it says??) They shoot Selim, and blame it on Connie, who had recently been with Selim. She is quickly sentenced to hang. Tarzan can't rescue her, because he's in jail for supposedly stealing Jayne, who was supposed to be a gift from the Germans to the Sheik. So, it's up to Boy and Cheetah to figure out how to get the adults out of their predicaments, which they do. After thrilling escapes, the 4 ride off toward the lost jungle on Jayne and another horse, with Hendrix and Arabs chasing them. They manage to keep ahead, heading into the jungle, where they encounter giant lizards, crocodiles, and a giant carnivorous plant, whose shoots spring from the ground, waving like so many vertical snakes. When Tarzan comes along all these 'snakes' come together to form a cage, which incapacitates Tarzan for awhile. But , the most fearsome beast in this prehistoric jungle is a monstrous mechanical spider, looking to be about the size of a rhino. Enough to give any arachnophobe a heart attack! Boy gets caught in its giant web for a while. Hendrix tracts them to this cave, and is about to shoot Connie when Tarzan swings down and knocks Hendrix into another web, right in front of the spider. Bye Bye, Hendrix! Somehow, all Tarzan's group get out of the way of the spider, and find some of the appropriate plants for Connie to somehow transport back to Jane.......Of course, Cheetah, the Chimp, is a continual clown, and occasionally helps get the others out of a mess. He even does a tightrope act for the Arabs to distract their attention. .......The screenplay is pretty silly, with many aspects not making much sense. Nonetheless, it's a pretty interesting story for some viewers, with the bonus of Cheetah.

A letter from his still absent mate "Jane" requests hefty jungle king Johnny Weissmuller (as Tarzan) go on a mission through Arabian desert sand to deliver some "fever medicine" needed by Allied troops. Adopted son Johnny Sheffield (as Boy) and pet chimp "Cheeta" tag along. Along the way, the trio team-up with adventurous Nancy Kelly (as Connie Bryce), a lady magician who loses her entourage. Arab-tinged Nazis and giant dinosaur-type animals cause trouble for the quartet. Watch out for the spider. It's all very silly, but with some nicely edited and photographed scenes.***** Tarzan's Desert Mystery (12/26/43) Wilhelm Thiele ~ Johnny Weissmuller, Johnny Sheffield, Nancy Kelly, Otto Kruger

Tarzan's Desert Mystery (1943) ** (out of 4) Jane, who once again sends Tarzan a letter saying she isn't coming home, also asks her boyfriend to get a secret formula that can cure troops fighting in the war. Tarzan, Boy and Cheetah set out to do this but end up fighting Arabs. I found it incredibly difficult to stay awake while watching this film and it took several viewings to be able to do so. I thought the first forty-minutes of this thing were deadly dull and lacked any nice comedy or action. The female lead also wasn't very interesting, which hurt matters. The film eventually picks up at the end when Tarzan must enter a mysterious jungle full of living vines, prehistoric creatures and a huge spider. If only the entire film had taken place here. This is the first Tarzan I've actually been disappointed in to the point where I probably won't watch it again.

TARZAN'S DESERT MYSTERY (RKO Radio, 1943), directed by Wilhelm Thiele, the eighth installment to the long running adventure series starring Johnny Weissmuller as the jungle hero, the second under the RKO Radio banner, and the only time during Weissmuller's 16 years in the titled role to have two releases in the same year. As with TARZAN TRIUMPHS (1943), his mate, Jane, is away (as explained in this segment through the reading of a letter that she away in England helping out in the war effort acting as nurse to the wounded soldiers), leaving her jungle warlord husband to remain behind and look after their young son, Boy (Johnny Sheffield) and their chimpanzee pet, Cheetah. Since this is war time, the screenwriters break away from the traditional intrusion of villainous white hunters or angry natives by having Tarzan matching wits with the Nazis once again. Unlike TARZAN TRIUMPHS, the Nazis take second precedence to what Tarzan is to encounter in his latest caper. Before a new adventure begins for both Tarzan and Boy, the story opens with an airplane flying over Tarzan's destination by which the co-pilot is seen throwing down a rock with an attached letter coming down on a miniature parachute. It is an airmail letter from Jane, which is opened and read to Tarzan by Boy. The letter has Jane asking Tarzan to hunt for giant carnivorous plants (plants with malaria serum), which can be found in the jungle on the other side of the desert, and have it sent to her in order to offer this fever medicine to the soldiers. Although it's written for Boy to remain behind, the young lad manages by getting his way with Tarzan, and, along with Cheetah, get to accompany him. While crossing the desert, Tarzan rescues a striped stallion from being whipped by a Karl Strader (Joseph Sawyer), sending the villain away and freeing the horse. The ever grateful animal accompanies Tarzan and Boy on their expedition. Later, Tarzan comes to the aid of Connie Bryce (Nancy Kelly), a lady magician, stranded in an Arab city following a North African USO tour. Because of her attempt to prevent the Sheik (Lloyd Corrigan) from an assassination attempt, Paul Heinrich, alias Hendrix, a Nazi leader (Otto Kruger), arranges for her to be accused of killing Prince Salam (Robert Lowery), and sentenced to die by hanging. Tarzan, imprisoned on the charges of stealing the stallion, breaks jail to save Connie. Afterwards, the trio face dangers in the jungle consisting of prehistoric creatures where Tarzan's to locate the carnivorous plants for Jane. Suspense builds when the Nazis are not far behind, forcing Connie and Boy to seek refuge in a cave. While roaming about, Boy finds himself trapped like a fly as while standing helplessly with his back glued against a gigantic spider web and arms stuck in an outstretched position, attracting the attention of the huge spider, slowly approaching towards his latest prey. Connie tries helping Boy out of this trap, but to no avail. As for Tarzan somewhere in the jungle, he has troubles of his own while entrapped inside a man-eating plant with no way of escaping.TARZAN'S DESERT MYSTERY, which plays like a Saturday matinée chaptered serial, containing villains, prehistoric creatures, rioting Arabs, a giant spider, and enough suspense in this slightly tight 70 minutes to certainly not disappoint any juvenile crowd. Edgar Rice Burrough's jungle hero continues to play the center of attention, and while this film actually appears better than it should have been, considering the modest budget, absence of the Jane character and contrived yarn, the scriptwriters have placed Tarzan into bizarre situations left to their own imagination. Obviously filmed in an indoor set, it would be questionable to find Tarzan and Boy walking through the hot desert or being exposed in the great outdoors without any signs of sunburn or tan on themselves. The supporting players consists of Frank Puglia (The Arab Dignitary); George J. Lewis (Hassan); and Nestor Paiva (The Prison Guard). Nancy Kelly, substituting for the Jane character, as once played in the MGM productions by Maureen O'Sullivan, makes an acceptable heroine; and Otto Kruger performs his task well as the nasty Nazi villain. The gigantic spider web scene, possibly the most talked about and memorable sequence in the entire movie, is not for the squeamish, especially when a villain gets caught onto the web and becomes a hardy meal for the spider. Naturally played for thrill or shock value at the time, today, this scene looks very artificial. While Tarzan finds himself encountering with prehistoric creatures (reminiscent to RKO's 1933 classic KING KONG) and man-eating plants instead of the usual hostile natives and wrestling crocodiles, this does stand apart from the previous efforts, thus, making it more acceptable as part of the horror genre.After many years as being aired on commercial television either on the late night hours or mid afternoon weekend showings, TARZAN'S DESERT MYSTERY finally reached its new destination of cable television on American Movie Classics where it found a new audience (1997-2000) and Turner Classic Movies (TCM premiere: May 21, 2011). TARZAN'S DESERT MYSTERY and the remaining five Weissmuller/Tarzan adventures from RKO Radio, have never been distributed to video cassette, but did make it to DVD around 2009. Next swing vine adventure: TARZAN AND THE AMAZONS (1945). (**1/2)