Jungle Jim in the Forbidden Land (1952)

After playing with our expectations, this turns out to be a very different sort of film.

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.

Great story, amazing characters, superb action, enthralling cinematography. Yes, this is something I am glad I spent money on.

All you need to be is a damsel in distress, here Angela Greene, cornered by a black panther which in Jim's arms looks like a kitten. She's a beautiful anthropologist searching for a mysterious people, giants of the jungle and as mysterious as the forbidden land itself. This has one of the better setups for the mid series, outwearing its welcome except for the kids who rushed to these on Saturday morning and the later youthful TV audiences who clamored for Tarzan, Bombs and any look back at the ever popular but dying serials so popular in those last days of the golden age of cinema. That's when they made em' fast, made em' cheap, and made em' in bulk. As long as Jim and his chimp pal Tamba cavorted through the African wilds, they could find an audience.Smartly, this shows the raid on Greene's canoe by dangerous hippos, reminding us of the dangers of these seemingly peaceful herbivores. Johnny Weissmuller deserves credit for going as long as he could, dealing once again with on-the-warpath natives, elephant poachers and Styrofoam sets. They actually name the tribal chief "Zulu", and there's a mysterious prophet like character named "the old one". Lester Matthews and Jean Willed are the obvious bad guys, part of Jim's expedition for nefarious reasons, utilizing truth serum to find out what they need to know. This seems to be a little more polished than previous episodes which were mostly rushed. A plot twist borrowed from "Island of Lost Souls" adds to the intrigue. Danger at every turn and a steady, fun pace puts this at above average.

Jungle Jim In The Forbidden Land is about Jungle Jim refusing to take anthropologist Angela Greene to a place in the jungle where living evidence of the fabled missing link is supposed to be. At the same time another woman of less character played by Jean Willes is looking to drive elephants through the jungle pass that goes through the missing link country. So a pair of agendas send Johnny Weissmuller into the forbidden land.Weissmuller is doing the humane thing, let these people alone. And one look at them when a man and woman get out of the jungle and start wreaking havoc on all around would convince most anyone that's a practical policy. Still both women want to get that hidden valley where Mr.&Mrs. Missing Link come from. And both are checking out Weissmuller too, for the specimen he is.Put all that together with Jungle Jim being framed for a murder he didn't commit and you have all the ingredients for this Jungle Jim feature. This one is done a bit more tongue and cheek than some of the others so it's bearable for adults.

Jungle Jim in the Forbidden Land (1952) ** (out of 4) Insane entry in the series has Jungle Jim (Johnny Weissmuller) given "truth serum", which makes him give away the location of the "giant people", a wolf man like tribe, which lives deep in the jungle. A group of mean people want to use them to locate some elephants so that they can be killed for their ivory. This eighth film in the series is only the third one that I've viewed but I'd be really scared if any of the others were as crazy and goofy as this one. I'm really not sure why they didn't call this JUNGLE JIM MEETS THE WOLF MAN because that's pretty much what it is. The "giant people" are more like missing link creatures but you can't help but look at them as werewolves in the sun. The creature make up is actually pretty good and a lot more believable than what we saw in Columbia's THE RETURN OF THE VAMPIRE, which was also directed by Landers. We also get several other outrageous scenes including one where Jim fights a hippo at the bottom of a river. The hippo is incredibly fake looking but this adds to some of the goofy charm. The funniest sequence is the one where Jim must fight a black panther, which features the worst stuffed animal I've ever seen. Stock footage is added in of course but this just makes the stuffed creature look even worse and seeing Weissmuller fight it was just hilarious. In the end this is a pretty bad movie but it's just so crazy that you can't help but find yourself entertained.

The Jungle Jim movies produced by Sam Katzman and starring Johnny Weismuller were all low grade jungle adventures made strictly to fill the bottom half of a double bill. Unless you watch them out nostalgia or, are like me, a fan of Weismuller, they are pretty rough going. None of them seem to have been made with idea of making something good. The concurrent Tarzan films at RKO with Lex Barker, and the Bomba the Jungle Boy series at Monogram starring former "Boy" Johnny Sheffield, while not great, were at least reasonably well produced.JUNGLE JIM IN THE FORBIDDEN LAND is slightly enlivened by the presence of the strange "giant people." They are not giants, just very tall. They are supposed to be some kind of missing link. The makeup by Clay Campell is surprisingly good for such a cheap picture, but the only problem is that the "giant people" look more like werewolves than some kind of "missing link". Otherwise, JUNGLE JIM IN THE FORBIDDEN is just another Jungle Jim movie with the usual perfunctory performances, light skinned Africans, Columbia backlot jungle, stock footage, Tamba's hijinks etc.