The Tarzan Collection

After years of taping these off the local television stations and then when AMC ran the segments a few years ago with fairly good prints, I'd given up of ever seeing the Tarzan films on DVD ~ but here they are in a beautifully packaged box set on four discs ~
"TARZAN THE APE MAN" (1932) featuring Weissmuller, O'Sullivan, Neil Hamilton, C. Aubrey Smith and directed by W.S. Van Dyke.
"TARZAN AND HIS MATE" (1934) with Weissmuller, O'Sullivan, Neil Hamilton, Paul Cavanaugh and directed by Bernard H. Hyman (this is my favorite Tarzan film - story and action sequences were way ahead of their time)
"TARZAN ESCAPES" (1936) with Weissmuller, O'Sullivan, John Buckler, Benita Hume, William Henry and directed by Richard Thorpe.
"TARZAN FINDS A SON" (1939) with Weissmuller, O'Sullivan, Johnny Sheffield, Ian Hunter, Henry Stephenson, Henry Wilcoxon, Laraine Day and directed by Richard Thorpe (one of the best in the early series)
"TARZAN'S SECRET TREASURE" (1941) with Weissmuller, O'Sullivan, Johnny Sheffield, Reginald Owen, Tom Conway, Philip Dorn, Barry Fitzgerald (one of my favorite Irish Actors - with Bing Crosby and later with John Wayne) and directed by Richard Thorpe.
"TARZAN'S NEW YORK ADVENTURE" (1942) with Weissmuller, O'Sullivan, Johnny Sheffield, Charles Bickford, Chill Wills (Francis the Talking Mule fame), Paul Kelly, Virginia Grey and directed by Richard Thorpe(which Tarzan and the rest of the cast are completely clothed in a civilized world of crooks, trying to take Boy away from Jane and Tarzan) all under the watchful eye of Edgar Rice Burroughs.

Hopefully Warner Brothers will release the next group of Weissmuller films he did for RKO Studios ~ the same quality and special features for those six films would be a welcome addition ~ just think a new generation of fans are on the brink of discovering the true Lord of the Jungle ~ TARZAN(in the guise of Johnny Weissmuller)...gotta love it!

Total Time: 4-DVD-Set ~ Warner Home Video 65995 ~ (6/08/2004)

THE TRANSFER: There's little to celebrate in this DVD collector's edition. Most of the films in the series suffer from a barrage of age related artifacts that create a very grainy, harsh visual presentation. The diminished picture quality improves moderately between each subsequent installment in the series. The gray scale seems poorly rendered and balanced on "Tarzan and his Mate" - much more so than on any of the other films in the series. The image suffers from lower contrast levels and a decided loss of fine detail in many of the scenes. There's also considerable shimmering in the background information, as though everything were shot on a matte process screen. Edge enhancement and way too much pixelization are present throughout most of these films as well as a hideous example of misregistration on Tarzan Finds A Son. For the rest of the batch - the balance and contrast is considerably better off. Ditto for the age related artifacts. In all cases the audio is mono and nicely balanced, though the critical ear will detect hiss and popping present in "Tarzan the Ape Man" and "Tarzan and his Mate". The movies are spread across four discs.

EXTRAS: There's a fantastic feature length documentary on the Tarzan phenomenon that is both comprehensive and compelling as well as some vintage short subjects. It is indeed a pity that no one thought to have an audio commentary track included for at least the first film in the series.

BOTTOM LINE: Though the MGM films take certain artistic liberties with Borough's original text, they remain the benchmark of cinematic Tarzan. The transfers, however, are below par.