Nope nope nope nope. This movie was painful to watch from start to finish. It was violent, sad, awkward, and gross. On purpose!
Some parts of the movie followed the book pretty closely in the beginning, but the plot went in a whole other direction and wound up in a completely different place, and I think I know why.
I think someone looked at the original text, and said, Well, this antiquated book believes that Tarzan’s noble blood is what makes him able to successfully learn how to live like a man, but we enlightened modern people don’t think that there is any such thing as noble blood, therefore we have to show that Tarzan is not able to successfully learn how to live like a man.
In other words, the book said nature; the movie said nurture. But people are the result of both! And let’s not forget choice. What we’re capable of depends at least somewhat on how hard we try.
Okay, so Tarzan doesn’t have a natural advantage that derives from noble blood, but he’s a human, and humans are good at learning stuff. Although I admit the learning process would be more difficult than the book describes, I think any story about Tarzan has to show that he has a human’s capacity for reason as well as an animal’s capacity for survival, and can learn anything he needs to learn.
Anyway, the less said about this movie the better. The moviemakers took a confident hero and turned him into a pitiful failure. I feel betrayed.
