Tarzan (1999)

In the midst of the Walt Disney Company’s countless releases, a number of them have fallen off the radar for one reason or another, even those once popular enough to spawn their own successful franchises. We’ve covered some of them on this blog before, but the one we’re looking at here is Tarzan (1999), released at the very end of what is known as the Disney Renaissance, a decade where the studio had been a critical and box office powerhouse. I remembered watching Disney’s Tarzan when it originally released in theaters, but was motivated to watch it again when I noticed we owned a sealed 2005 DVD copy, meaning it had been 14-20 years since we had last seen it. After finally re-watching the film, I can confidently say that it not only held up well after 20 years, it’s also an underrated Disney classic that deserves renewed recognition.

In the late 1860s, an English couple and their infant son escape from a shipwreck and end up near an uncharted rainforest. With what they can salvage from the wreckage, the couple build a large treehouse. At the same time, the gorilla leader Kerchak (Lance Henriksen) and his mate Kala (Glenn Close) live peacefully with their son until he is killed by the leopard Sabor. Soon after, Kala hears a baby crying and stumbles on the treehouse, where the English couple have been killed by Sabor as well. Kala rescues the baby and, despite Kerchak’s disapproval, raises him as her own son, naming him “Tarzan”. Tarzan (Alex D. Linz) struggles to fit in with the gorillas, but grows up to become a strong gorilla-like man (Tony Goldwyn) and gains some respect from Kerchak after defeating Sabor. Then, a British exploration team, whose aim is to study the gorillas, appears and Tarzan rescues a woman, Jane Porter (Minnie Driver), from a group of baboons. When Tarzan realizes there are other creatures like him in the world, he is caught between two worlds, his identities as a gorilla and a human, and must also prevent the hunter Clayton (Brian Blessed) from destroying whatever peace the gorillas have left.

Tarzan (Tony Goldwyn) interacts with the explorers; L-R: Tarzan, Clayton (Brian Blessed),
Professor Archimedes Q. Porter (Nigel Hawthorne), Jane Porter (Minnie Driver).

While I’m not familiar with the source material, Tarzan of the Apes by Edgar Rice Burroughs, I thought Tarzan told its story very well. The central themes of family and humanity are strongly interwoven throughout the plot and Tarzan’s character development is well-paced. His fascination with the human world and budding romantic feelings for Jane feel natural and his relationships with his family and friends, the tomboyish gorilla Terk (Rosie O’Donnell) and neurotic elephant Tantor (Wayne Knight), feel genuine. The story is also engaging and moves along at a good pace, but knows when to slow down enough to highlight some of the more emotional moments.

While Tarzan’s story is generally serious, with a few touches of comedy, there is one moment that stands out as generally sillier than the rest of the film. More specifically, a scene where a group of gorillas led by Terk, with some help from Tantor, end up trashing the explorers’ camp out of an unfamiliarity with the objects and technology present. Having such a scene is one thing, but making it a small musical sequence made it feel somewhat out of place, like a filler scene that wouldn’t have heavily affected the movie if it was removed. Apparently, the directors did consider cutting it a few times, but left it in because it tested well with children.

A major highlight, of course, is the animation. Everything is detailed and fluid, complemented by dynamic camera work and powerful use of lighting to help give attention to the more tense and emotional moments. The animators also clearly put a lot of work into the expressions and movements of the animals and humans, but a lot of the effort went into the character of Tarzan. As he is an ape-man, a man of two worlds, he moves convincingly like both a gorilla and a human, with a physique and expressive body language to match. The most impressive shots in the film are when Tarzan is surfing on jungle vines, as they both create a memorably striking image and showcase the more ambitious animation techniques on display. Both the vine surfing and fight scenes also cleverly combine CG with traditional animation to allow the film to achieve shots not normally possible with traditional alone (although by now I could kind of tell when certain shots were assisted with CG).

The vine surfing is still impressive to watch.

Within the impressive animation, however, I did notice minor continuity errors. They’re not very noticeable, though one that really stuck out was when Tarzan got scratched on the chest during his fight with Sabor, but had fully healed once he had finished off the leopard. More noticeable now is also the film’s tendency to avoid directly showing a good amount of the violence, especially when someone gets injured. This didn’t detract that much from the entertainment value, as it did lead to one powerful shot during the climax, but I thought it worth noting.

The voice actors also help bring the characters to life by showing off their personalities and, for some, character development. The latter trait is most apparent in Tony Goldwyn’s performance as Tarzan, as he’s able to show off his compassion and sense of wonder while also displaying a deeper emotional range and realistically give the impression of someone learning about another world and culture behind a language barrier.

That’s not to say, however, that the other voice actors don’t give equally strong performances. Glenn Close and Lance Henriksen are good in their respective roles as Kala and Kerchak, as the characters’ contrasting viewpoints and personalities come out well in their performances. Minnie Driver helps Jane serve as a good foil for Tarzan, believably showcasing a woman who has to break down the language barrier for a curious ape-man while dealing with the differences between England and the jungle. Brian Blessed is also entertaining as Clayton and provides just the right voice and inflection for the character’s manipulative nature. In an interesting twist, however, Blessed also performs the signature Tarzan yell, as Tony Goldwyn couldn't provide a satisfactory take.

What’s also interesting are the casting choices that could have been. Brendan Fraser, for instance, had auditioned for the role of Tarzan, but would ultimately play the lead role in George of the Jungle (1997), a film that’s more or less a parody of Tarzan. Terk was also originally written as a male gorilla, but changed to a female after Rosie O’Donnell auditioned for the role. Perhaps the strangest one, however, would be casting Woody Allen as Tantor before he got pulled away by Jeffrey Katzenberg for Dreamworks’ Antz (1998) in exchange for a distribution deal. As a result, Wayne Knight was cast in his place.

Tantor (Wayne Knight) was almost voiced by Woody Allen.

Tarzan also takes a decidedly different approach to the Disney musical. Rather than have the characters sing, which directors Kevin Lima and Chris Buck were actively against for the film, the songs, written and performed by Phil Collins, instead act as a narration complementing major moments in Tarzan’s journey. One highlight is the song “Two Worlds”, which not only appears at various points in the story, but is also worked into the score by Mark Mancina as a major theme. Two others, “Son of Man” and “Strangers Like Me”, perfectly suit the well-placed montages within the story and underscore Tarzan’s growth as a person.

Out of the other songs in the soundtrack, “You’ll Be in My Heart” was touted as an Oscar contender and would go on to win the award for Best Original Song in both the 1999 Golden Globes and 1999 Academy Awards. It was also nominated for a Grammy Award in 2000, but lost to Madonna’s “Beautiful Stranger”. Something that I feel too interesting not to bring up, however, is that since Trey Parker and Marc Shaiman’s “Blame Canada” lost to Phil Collins at the Academy Award, the South Park episode “Timmy 2000” features a parody of “You’ll Be in My Heart” called “You’ll Be in Me”.

One last thing to note here is that Disney’s Tarzan had its own franchise of sorts. After Tarzan, the company would air a short-lived television series, The Legend of Tarzan, from 2001 to 2003 for 39 episodes and release two direct-to-video sequel films. The first, Tarzan & Jane (2002), is a compilation of three unaired episodes from The Legend of Tarzan while the second, Tarzan II (2005), is a midquel set during the events of Tarzan. Interestingly, Tarzan also received a Broadway musical adaptation in 2006, which my sealed DVD copy of the film contained an ad for. Although it opened to mixed reviews and closed in 2007 after 486 performances, the musical still saw a few foreign productions and even ran in Germany until as late as 2018.

Of course, I have to mention that Tarzan also saw representation in Kingdom Hearts (2002) through the game’s Deep Jungle world. Deep Jungle was set to return in the 2005 entry Chain of Memories, but due to copyright issues with the Edgar Rice Burroughs estate, its representation was reduced to a scrapped Jungle King Attack Card hidden away in the game’s code.

Tarzan as he appears in Kingdom Hearts (2002).

Time has been kind to Disney’s Tarzan. The story is well-written and filled with fleshed out characters, the animation is still impressive on every level and the music from Phil Collins is catchy and memorable. This film is truly an underrated classic and I would highly recommend it to animation and Disney fans alike. While we might not get a new Tarzan film from Disney anytime soon, this one is good enough.