The Lost Tribe (1949)

A Masterpiece!

If you're interested in the topic at hand, you should just watch it and judge yourself because the reviews have gone very biased by people that didn't even watch it and just hate (or love) the creator. I liked it, it was well written, narrated, and directed and it was about a topic that interests me.

I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

It's a good bad... and worth a popcorn matinée. While it's easy to lament what could have been...

***SPOILERS*** One of the better "Jungle Jim" movies has Jungle Jim, Johnny Weissmuller,have it out with a bunch of greedy fortune hunters who are trying to find out the the city, loaded with diamonds & gold, beyond the mountain range Dzamm is located. It's the son Chot, Paul Marion, of the emperor of Dzamm Zoron, Nelson Leigh, who almost lets the cat out of the bag. That by Chot falling helplessly in love with the niece Norina, Myrna Dll, of the head fortune hunter Captain Rawlins, Rulph Dunn, and bringing her presents strutted with diamonds from the city. That has Norina turn the screws or charms on Chot in getting him to tell her where the city of Dzamm is located.Jungle Jim gets into the act or movie by saving Chot's sister princess Li Wanna's, Elena Verdugo, life from first being eating by a man eating crocodile and then lion almost before he had a chance to introduce himself to her! While keeping the jungle safe for it's less dangerous inhabitants Jungle Jim also saved his gorilla friend Zimba, actually a guy in a monkey suit, and chimpanzee companion, who's in fact the real deal, from another ferocious lion attack. That act of heroism on Jungle Jim's part would later figure or be rewarded in the movie exciting final and hair raising sequence.It's Emperor Zoron who at first tries to placate Captain Rowlins and his partner Calhoun, Joseph Vitale, with a bag of precious and uncut diamonds delivered by Jungle Jim that only wets their greedy appetites to find out where they came from:The city of Dzamm. Holding Jungle Jim and princess Li Wanna hostage these greedy diamond hunters and their motley crew of drunken, with both booze and greed, sailors make their way to Dzamm knowing that the peace loving population there being totally against the use violence are nothing but a bunch of wimpy pushovers. ***SPOILERS*** Breaking into the the Emperor Zoron's golden palace Captain Rawlins Calhoun & Co.have the run of the place like a bunch of kids in a toy or candy store grabbing everything, diamonds jewels gold & silver, that isn't nailed down. It's just when things looked at their worst that Zimba and his band of hairy and unkempt mountain gorillas came to the people of Dzamm as well as Jungle Jim and Princess Li Wanna's rescue. Heart lifting final with the monkeys or gorillas doing in the greedy and power drunk fortune hunters saving Jungle Jim most of the trouble of doing it himself. There was a sad note in the movie in that Chot who by getting up enough courage and not being a pacifist saved both Jungle Jim and his sister Princess Li Wanna's lives when they were being hostage by the fortune hunters. But that was the price he had to pay for revealing the secret of the city of Dzamm to his love Norina. As things transpired in the movie Norina in fact wasn't around, she was murdered by Calhoun, or lived long enough to see it anyway.

Johnny Weissmuller's second appearance of Jungle Jim concerns him protecting the secret and treasures of an ancient civilized tribe called Zhamm who have built a hidden city. The son of the chief has been paying court to a girl in another place giving her trinkets made of precious metal. That gets the antenna treasure of Joseph Vitale and Ralph Dunn raised.Fortunately for the good guys Jungle Jim performed an intervention when he takes sides against a lion attacking a gorilla and her baby. He also takes out a crocodile and a shark as well during the course of the film. That wins him the gratitude of the gorilla community and in the climax they prove to be of invaluable help.The Lost Tribe is high camp all the way, gloriously bad cinema, but kind of fun.

The Lost Tribe (1949) * 1/2 (out of 4) The second film in the Columbia series has a group of white folks showing up in the jungle to do whatever it takes to locate a hidden city where an unnumbered amount of diamonds are. Of course things take a violent turn so Jungle Jim (Johnny Weissmuller) must step in and put a stop to it. I'm viewing this series out of order but to date this here is without a question the worst I've seen and that's saying quite a bit because in all honesty the entire series has been pretty bad. I'm really not sure where to start but we could discuss the poor acting, the laughable rubber crocodiles or perhaps we could discuss the really bad stock footage. We could discuss all of the horrible things but what would be the point of that? Instead I'll bring up the one classic thing that makes the film worth sitting through and that's a scene towards the middle of the picture where we get a lion going up against a gorilla, which is of course just a man inside an outfit. The fight between the two was pretty exciting and I must say that it had such a campy feel to it that I couldn't help but think that the entire film should be better known to fans of bad cinema. While watching the fight I had to wonder what the guy inside the outfit was thinking. Sure, the lion was trained to work with actors but if I was inside that suit I'd be worried that the lion would think he was going up against something real. Either way, thankfully both the lion and gorilla give the best performances in the film and they keep it from being a complete bomb. Good job boys!

Having just watched the original "Jungle Jim" movie from the prior year, I couldn't help noticing how similar the plot elements were for this follow up film, as the jungle hero agrees to help Zoron, the leader of Zom, from trespassing white men who would plunder the kingdom of it's treasure. Which wouldn't have been so enticing if Jim hadn't agreed to offer the villains a handful of diamonds each to agree to stay away. Now there's a strategy, and Jim was supposed to know the mind of greedy white men! If you enjoy a good healthy dose of goofiness with your jungle flicks, this one will be right up your alley. Jim battles crocodiles and sharks, usually after an impressive dive into the water to keep viewers reminded of his genuine Olympic prowess. Throw in a small army of men in gorilla suits and you have the makings for a rousing finale to defeat the bad guys; you know your main villain is truly evil when he kills his own niece early in the story. Those gorillas looked awfully similar to the ones played by Ray "Crash" Corrigan in a whole load of ape films from the 1940's and 50's, so it came as no surprise to learn that the movie itself was filmed at the Corriganville Ranch in Simi Valley, California. I didn't know Corrigan had understudies.I had to do a double take when Chot (Paul Marion), son of Zoron, reminds his sister Li Wanna (Elena Verdugo) that it's forbidden for any white person to see the land of Zom. Hmm, and that was shortly after she led Jungle Jim to Zom to meet her father. No sense letting inconsistency in the story line stand in the way of an entertaining jungle flick.For anyone keeping track, this film's entry in the 'non African animals appearing in an African setting' would be the quick stock shot of a South American toucan. You have to be attentive though, it's a quickie. Fortunately too, the movie itself comes in at slightly over an hour, not too strenuous for the attention span if you go for this kind of stuff like I do. But one question though, for an ancient lost city, just how many times did Chot, Li Wanna and Jim go back and forth to Zom in the course of the story - I just couldn't keep track.