The Legend of Tarzan Movie Blurb by Shale July 11, 2016 This movie has been playing since July 3rd and I really didn't know if I wanted to see another Tarzan movie. I just watched the 1984 Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes, which also claimed to follow Edgar Rice Burroughs' novel. But, it was a nice (tho hot and muggy) day to bike 8 miles to the AMC at Aventura, so I took in a matinee. This movie almost is a sequel to the 1984 movie, since that one was mostly a setup to how John Clayton III came to be raised by gorillas in Africa then rescued by a Belgian mercenary and taken back to England to become Lord Greystoke. This story has John Clayton (Alexander Skarsgard) in England with his wife Jane Porter Clayton (Margot Robbie) , whom he met while still wild in Africa. He is quite well adjusted to being a civilized Englishman but is asked to go to Africa and report on the Congo at the request of King Leopold of the Belgians. He is also persuaded by a U.S. Envoy, George Washington Williams (Samuel L. Jackson) who suspects that King Leopold's mercenaries are enslaving the natives in the Congo. One of those mercenaries is Captain Léon Rom (Christoph Waltz) who is leading the exploitation of the Congo and its natives and who has ulterior motives for getting Tarzan back in Africa. Rom - The Bad Guy Tarzan and Jane sneak past Rom and go right to the old homeland where extended family, both human and gorilla live. They enjoy the reunion and a little animal pleasure (PG-13 of course). Jane & Tarzan in Africa But, Capt. Rom finds them, kidnaps a bunch of natives and Jane and Tarzan is in pursuit with his new ally George, who was U.S. Army since the Civil War and a very good shot. Tarzan & George Run Thru the Jungle On the adventure to free all the captives and stop Rom from getting a cache of diamonds to pay off thousands of mercenaries who will then dominate the Congo, Tarzan has some old family disputes to settle with his stepbrother the ape. (to their credit, they did not have a human beat a gorilla mano-a-mano. Even the fictional super human Tarzan gets his butt handed to him by the gorilla - but does survive) And, eventually, when Tarzan is outnumbered by some hostile natives well ... family ya know. Tarzan With a Little Help From His Friends This movie only got a 36% fresh by the aggregate critics on Rotten Tomatoes. They criticized its generic plot and sluggish pace. I find it about on par with the older movie, which was very slow-paced as well. This one had CGI but the gorillas were not as endearing as the old puppet ones in the 1984 movie. BTW, in that movie which had beautiful cinematography, my criticism was who told Tarzan (When he grew up into Christopher Lambert) to start wearing a loin cloth. They had beautiful shots of this naked little boy swinging on vines like his ape family and even as a young adult, but when we see the main character he is covered. At least in this movie it is implied that Tarzan as an adult wild man when he first meets Jane in the jungle is totally naked as seen in her expression. She and her dad probably civilized him before taking him back to England.