We’ve already looked at "Tarzan II," which was by my own mistake assuming it was the sequel immediately after "Tarzan," and how it wasn’t an entirely bad sequel; it just felt unnecessary. It ultimately wasn’t the sequel that I was expecting to see, following the likes of "Mulan II" or "The Hunchback of Notre Dame II," the latter being far worse than the former, but still not ‘good.’ "Tarzan and Jane" was the sequel that I was expecting, and the sequel that I did not want to see. The animation style is completely different, none of the voice-actors are the same, the entire structure of the film is flawed, and the entire film is unbelievable. Most of these problems can be explained by looking at who the production company was: Disney Television Animation.
First off, let’s take a look at the animation. It’s bad. It’s pretty darn bad. I’d say it’s on par, if not a little better than "The Hunchback of Notre Dame II." It would be fine if it was a Saturday morning television show. It would be decent if it wasn’t a completely different style than the original, and the sequel that came after it. It would be OK if it wasn’t for the lack of color depth and gradient, or the lack of shadows. The characters themselves appear very flat, and it is very obvious when they are static and not moving at all when another character is talking, appearing like a lifeless mannequin. The greatest sin I can find here is that the entire film is of a different style than the original, something the numerical sequel was actually able to achieve. It appears like something entirely different, with only the half-naked man with weird dreadlocked hair shouting as he swings from vine to vine. It looks like it was an episode of a television show and not a true sequel. And that’s a bad thing; a sequel should look like it’s original, if at least in having the same art style. Even "The Hunchback of Notre Dame II" had that! (Although there were many other problems with the animation in that film.) That one looked more like it’s original than this one did. The lack of color depth and shading on the characters just makes them look very flat, and makes it very apparent that they aren’t really in the jungle, and that the jungle is only a part of the background (which also suffers considerably with even less detail than the numerical sequel that followed it).
Not getting the same voice-actors is understandable, especially considering this was made by an entirely different studio, and that they were using the voice-actors that they had under contract from their TV spinoff of the Tarzan name, “The Legend of Tarzan.” The main problem with this is that, as a film, the original characters had some charm and personality that made it entertaining and slightly funny, whereas in this one all the characters are very matter of fact, and the only true attempts at humor are jokes about the rump and flatulence. It’s OK not to have the same voice-actor. It is much better to have them, or at least some of them, but if none of them are present, then if their impressions are done wrong it comes across as bad imitation milk. No one likes bad imitation milk; it tastes gross and you want to spit it out after taking a sip.
The structure of the movie is set up in a way that essentially stitches three television episodes together. I don’t mean to say that they took previously aired episodes, slapped them together and labeled it a film, but there are three ‘flashbacks’ that serve as the main content of the film, taking about twenty minutes for each ‘flashback.’ The main conflict of the movie is that Jane doesn’t know what to do for their anniversary. That’s it. And that doesn’t get resolved until the last ten minutes or so. The ‘flashbacks’ are each of the secondary characters, such as Terk, Tantor and the Professor each bringing up a story as to why Jane shouldn’t do a certain thing. I could spoil the ending of the film quite easily, but I’m sure you can guess what happens at the end. Structuring the film in this way isn’t inherently bad. It is done in other films, and done well in most cases. For instance, "Kronk’s New Groove" does it in a relatively fine way, while there are many other countless non-Disney films that use vignettes to tell little stories that contribute to a wider picture, such as "Smoke" or "Coffee and Cigarettes." The problem with "Tarzan and Jane" is that it feels too much like a television show. If I paid to see a movie, I expect to see a movie, not three episodes of a not-so-great TV show. You could even get up after each one and use the bathroom, using the time in between like a commercial break, return and not miss anything important.
As for the music… It’s essentially non-existent. Thirty seconds in, the Phil Collins theme for Tarzan plays but is accompanied by someone else, who I didn’t recognize and don’t think is famous enough to name. The only other song throughout the whole film is the song at the very end which is by the female singer I assume also accompanied Phil Collins in the intro, but it is just her, and it is just a ‘meh’ song; it doesn’t really do anything but give the hope that the end credits will arrive soon.
Finally, the unbelievability of it all… OK, OK. I know it is a Disney movie about a man who was raised by apes in an African jungle, who swings from vine to vine and slides along mossy branches wearing nothing but a loin cloth and is married to an English Professor’s daughter, but it is impossible to suspend your disbelief for this film. It was entirely possible in the first; the original actually made sense out of most of it, and the numerical sequel as well, but this one really takes the cake. For instance, in the original, Tarzan was raised by the apes, so it made sense that he understood their language (however Disney did the audience a little bit of a disservice by having their language in English, and also having English thrown in later, most likely confusing some children, I am sure), but in "Tarzan and Jane," Jane can understand Terk and Tantor perfectly, and so can the Professor. They can have full conversations with each other, while they were not themselves raised by apes or elephants. Sure, you could argue that Tarzan taught it to them. But it’s been a total of what? A year? This movie had me doubting it from the start, and so each time it asked me to suspend my disbelief I could not. I was constantly talking to myself (going quite insane with each sequel I watch…), saying things such as,“No, they are dead. No, they should be dead. They are definitely dead right now. That killed them. Why is that there? Why are they there?” One of the ‘flashbacks’ involves three of Jane’s friends coming to visit her. The entire premise of that doesn’t make any sense. Why would they be going to visit her? Didn’t they end the original with Tarzan asking if they would come back and the Professor or someone said that they couldn’t because it was such a long and costly trip? So now three relatively high-class twenty-or-something women are allowed to just hitch a ride on a ship that happens to be going down to that specific jungle on the African continent? There’s also a trading post in the jungle by the water. Are they saying that since the events of the first movie that specific jungle had enough wanted resources to warrant establishing a trading center and was constantly being sailed to? I don’t think a trading post would have looked like the trading post that was depicted in the film either; a warehouse type of building full of ‘supplies.’ And where does the owner/manager go between trips? Where does he sleep? What happens when no one comes for months on end because it would take that long to get there by ship? What happens when he gets incredibly lonely and Tarzan and Jane or the Professor do not want to speak with him? Do they get along well with the operator of the trading post? Or does Tarzan and the rest of the main characters despise his presence, slowly degrading the jungle? Starting the movie with one huge unbelievable event is not a good way to start at all. If a film intended to throw something so utterly unbelievable like, say, time travel or going through a wormhole, then it should introduce or do those things toward or at the end, after establishing a serious beginning of the film so I’m not left questioning it through the rest of the entire thing. "2001: A Space Odyssey" does this incredibly well, introducing the Monolith in the first chapter but without making it do anything very odd other than just randomly appearing. Then it appears in the second chapter but after it was uncovered on the moon, and upon touching it causes a painful high-pitched sound; this is odd, definitely, but since we’ve already seen it before, it is now mystical and mysterious. Then when it appears for the last time at the end, it transports Dave to another dimension outside of time where he is simultaneously being born, aging and dying. This is an unbelievable concept, but because we were introduced to it so early on in a believable manner, it is much easier to suspend disbelief.
Overall, I found this movie to be a train wreck. Coming to thirty minutes left of the film, after enduring two of the ‘flashbacks,’ I thought that those had stopped and that the main conflict of the film would be addressed, but it wasn’t. As soon as they started another ‘flashback,’ I had to stop and take a break; I couldn’t take any more of it in that sitting. If you just watched "Tarzan" and feel a hankering for more Phil Collins and jungle shenanigans and don’t feel like wasting an hour of your life, then watch "Tarzan II," not this one. I do not recommend this to anyone, although it may be used as a busying or punishment tool for children by parents (that may be a little too mean, however…). This should not have been made. Instead, it should have been a special one-hour long episode of the television show as, maybe, a series finale or something.
