Tarzana, the Wild Woman (1969) User Reviews

Topless Jungle Girl: The Movie

[rduchmann · 4/10 · 12 June 2000]

African expedition finds wild white girl living with animals on a backlot jungle set. Although not reflected in the IMDB credits, the titular (and then some) role is played by Femi Benussi, at her most gorgeous. There are bad guys and good guys on the expedition, but the principal point of the film is summed up in the observation that Femi spends about 99% of her screen time wearing nothing but a little junglekini thong bottom. (She looks terrific, traveling the jungle on elephantback.) At one point she finds some of the expedition's castoff junk, including discarded clothing, and slips into a jacket she's found in the debris. Her pet chimp eyes her up and down, then shakes his head "no" and she slips right back out of the jacket. (This seems to be conclusive proof that the Darwinian theory is, after all, correct.)

One of numerous topless jungle girl movies emanating from Europe in the late 1960s and 1970s, this is par for the genre. This was not released in the US till about 1976, and then with partly anglicized credits which omitted Femi altogether. The only US video print I have seen, on the Sinister Cinema label, is a bit scratchy but watchable. Femi is worth a wow! in this. (So now where can I find a copy of AMAZONS FOR TWO ADVENTURERS, with peachy Marie Ekorre in a 1970s German version of this perennial favorite theme among voyeurs?)

Only a couple of things stand out in this Italian Tarzan gender variant

[Leofwine_draca · 4/10 · 5 November 2016]

Only the Italians would have the audacity to focus an entire film around the spectacle of a "jungle girl" running around wearing only a small thong. A cheap and shoddy bad film which will prove to be a hoot for lovers of the obscure and bizarre, this set-bound jungle adventure romp features a group of guys and girls hunting through the jungle for a girl who has been brought up in the wild by animals. All manner of low-budget mayhem ensues, as half of the party turn out to be traitors and vicious natives and jungle animals attack. The plot is nothing more than a female version of the oft-filmed Tarzan story, but it lacks the curious mixture of glossiness and raw excitement that most Tarzan films have to offer. Instead, we're left with unconvincing sets and plenty of stock footage to pad out the predictable tale.

Inserted scenes include plenty of native rituals (in which topless black women dance seductively to the beat of a drum) and plenty of shots of elephants going about their business in the jungle. Sometimes the film cuts between a set-bound jungle location to a shot of Tarzana swinging through the trees on a vine and the effect is less than impressive. Tarzana also plays with lions and an irritating chimpanzee to show how close to nature she is. Of course, most of the danger comes from within the party of explorers rather than outside as their ranks are torn apart by scheming baddies wanting to get a large inheritance for themselves.

The cast is a usual stereotyped B-movie bunch, with the square-jawed fearless leader, the supporting buxom blonde bimbo, the evil upper-class Brit (who bears an uncanny resemblance to Tim Curry!), to the swarthy bad guy, the overweight jolly bearded friend and the lower-down-the-line native guides, whose lives are predictably cheap. Femi Benussi essays the role of Tarzana and frankly I found her to be pretty irritating. Sure, she walks around topless for the entire movie, but her childlike naivety quickly becomes wearing and her character a fool. Much more to my style was Franca Polesello playing the token blonde, who also spends the film stripping off and taking impromptu showers in waterfalls. Hilariously, she bares her breasts at the end of the movie, in order to appetise the male viewers and also show Tarzana that she is the "same" as her.

Ken Clark is the imported American lead and manages to be quite a likable chap, although his expression is limited and his character even more so. Being a film made in the late '60s, with the boundaries of censorship breaking down, the film introduces a minor sleazy aspect to the proceedings as a pervert watches the naked girls with glee and later on tries unsuccessfully to rape one of the women. As the nudity actually fits the context in this case the characters seem at ease with it and it does seem natural, and at least has a plot as well (unlike the majority of those cheapie nudist-flick pics of the early '60s). The violence, of people being shot, speared or eaten by a cheetah, is bloodless and kept to a minimum. While admittedly a bad movie, TARZANA, THE WILD GIRL is a fun film to watch with much to recommend to bad film lovers.

Boring, despite the nudity (!)

[gridoon2024 · 4/10 · 20 March 2011]

Ken Clark took a break from his prolific at the time Eurospy career to made this boring and cheap (it's LOADED with stock footage) jungle adventure flick. It has little to recommend it besides the frequent nudity not only by Femi Benussi as the title character (she also has a very beautiful smile), but by Franca Polesello (she also has very beautiful eyes) and a native girl as well. Speaking of "native girls", I am reminded of one of the greatest lines ever heard in a Marx Brothers movie - "Animal Crackers": "We took some pictures of the native girls but they weren't developed. But we're going back there in a couple of weeks!". Even for pre-code Hollywood, that line was quite daring. Of course all that has nothing to do with "Tarzana", but there's nothing much more to be said about "Tarzana" anyway! *1/2 out of 4.

Some Nudity But Very Little Else

[Michael_Elliott · 14 January 2018]

Tarzana, the Wild Woman (1969)

* 1/2 (out of 4)

Glen Shipper (Ken Clark) is a hunter who is asked by Sir Donovan to search the African jungles where a plan crashed fifteen-years earlier. On this plane was his family, family and young daughter. Shipper heads into the jungles where he learns of a young woman known as Tarzana.

This Italian take-off on TARZAN isn't exactly the greatest movie ever made but there's enough camp here to where some may be able to get some mild entertainment out of it. For the most part this film is about as harmless as they come as you get a bunch of scenes in some woods (probably not an actual jungle) and of course there's the female Tarzana and her naked body.

This here is pure exploitation as we see the young woman going around doing her jungle thing while also checking out her own body. You see, Tarzana's boobs aren't all that big so when the new group of people enter the jungle, she notices a blonde with big boobs taking a shower. This causes Tarzana to see things a bit differently. Yes, this is the type of stuff that happens in this film. Oh yeah, you've also got the actors walking around this wooded area and more times than not you can't help but think that all of these scenes were shot at once.

I wouldn't say that Femi Benussi gave a good performance as Tarzana but she doesn't as much as was possible for this type of role. You've also got Clark picking up a paycheck. Most people will probably remember him from the horror cult classic ATTACK OF THE GIANT LEECHES and I must admit that it was fun seeing him here.

With all of that said, TARZANA, THE WILD WOMAN suffers the most because it's just so boring. Nothing ever really happens outside of the nudity. There's no real action. No adventure. Heck, there's really no laughs or love interest or anything else for that matter. They basically took a one-note joke (a female Tarzan) and did nothing with it.

A really drab and forgettable jungle adventure exploitation snoozer

[Woodyanders · 3/10 · 17 May 2008]

The central premise of this dull and meandering snorefest is ripe to bursting with potentially explosive trash flick promise: a motley bunch of insufferably bland British explorers go trekking into the dangerous jungle of Nairobi, Africa and discover the mythical wild jungle lass Tarzana, a total knockout who's really the daughter of a wealthy English lord who grew up in the jungle on her own after surviving a plane crash when she was just a little girl. Alas, talent-barren director Guido Malatesta and equally unskilled screenwriter Phillip Shaw severely undermine said promise with a regrettably poor execution: the slack pacing, the talky, agonizingly drawn-out script, the leaden acting, the infrequent, invariably flat and unexciting action scenes, the crummy dialogue ("For one hundred thousand dollars I'm obliged to think of something"), the horribly unmelodious droning orchestral mush score, a tedious surplus of cheap'n'cheesy travelogue footage, and a tiresome assortment of boringly one-dimensional cardboard characters all add up to one supremely stinky and dissatisfying celluloid lemon. Okay, the sumptuously buxom and voluptuous Euro sleaze movie queen Femi Benussi cuts a striking figure as the luscious, mostly naked feral honey who comes complete with the standard collection of loyal animal companions (a large elephant that Tarzana uses to ride around the jungle, a sickeningly cute lion, and, of course, the inescapable adorable comic relief klepto chimpanzee), but not even Femi's eminently delectable whole lotta woman physique can inject any much-needed vitality into this lifeless and lethargic washout.

Tarzana, the Wild Girl (1969)

[trimbolicelia · 6/10 · 17 December 2020]

At best, fair Italian-made, English-dubbed jungle adventure. A group of folks are sent to Africa to see if a rich lord's baby granddaughter survived a plane crash 17 years before. Why wait so long? Anyway the safari includes sincere good guys and nefarious bad guys. The granddaughter survived to become the scantily dressed title character. A fair amount of nudity (women only) is thrown at the audience. The quality of the Sinister Cinema DVD-R is pretty poor, but apparently no good quality versions are available.

Good Euro 'Female Tarzan' Movie

[GSeditor · 9/10 · 17 July 2001]

Of course, the main attraction is the topless Femi Benussi as the title heroine. Beyond that, it is a very simple but OK jungle adventure. The production values are adequate, you get to see Tarzana herself riding real elephants, kissing real lions, not just insert stock footage. It should also be noted that the 'African native' music accompanying the dances are really great, not the cheesy, stereotyped, crude "savages' music" (!) you might expect to get.