Healthy Disney entry that struggles in its representation and narrative but holds up with music and animation.

Rating: 6/10 (23 March 2008)

I do not think this film lacks the Disney 'spark', nor do I think it lacks the Disney 'magic' that so many of their films carry and that makes them so enjoyable. If anything, this Disney effort doesn't have any magic at all but that is only from a subjective point of view regarding the film's content itself. Whereas past protagonists have had magic lamps, have magically been given legs and have suffered magical epiphanies that makes them wan to go back and fight for what is rightfully theirs; Tarzan, as a film, is more down to Earth and on this level is more of a 'realistic' Disney film.
This is not the first Disney film to deal with colonialism of some sort. 1995's Pocahontas had similar themes of outsiders visiting a rural utopia in which morals and understandings were happily being lived out. Like Tarzan, Pocahontas was a very 'real' film what with it being set in this world but its boundaries were blurred a little when that willow tree started talking to the characters. In this case, the outsiders visiting the rural world are initially only very few with the rest of the crew and the 'Governor Ratcliffe' character not yet apart of proceedings although Clayton (Blessed) looks suspiciously like the 1995 film's antagonist. One of the other two characters initially part of the set up is Jane (Driver) who, in a reverse of Pocahontas' set up, is a female visiting a male 'savage' rather than the other way around. Finally, as a villain, Clayton embodies all the necessary psychical traits of Ratcliffe as well as the dreams of a bigger and better life for him back home (at the expense of the new found riches, of course)
So this film has a lot in common with Pocahontas in that sense but is it that good? Is it perhaps better than Pocahontas? My opinion is 'no, it is not' but it does come strikingly close to being better. Like I said, this does not lack Disney magic and Disney spark but that does not mean it contains enough anyway. From a storytelling point of view, Tarzan is pretty poor but so was 1992's Aladdin  only thing there was that it had the Genie character to keep laughs and entertainment flowing thick and fast; there is no loud and magical 'kick' to this, just a simple 'girl-meets-boy' premise and a sad back-story regarding the hero's parents. But that's the way it goes in terms of storytelling. On the whole, I was impressed. It is clear that the producers saw George of the Jungle from two years previous and were impressed by Brendan Fraser's performance of George; in terms of look and physique than actual acting because Tarzan in the film looks strikingly like him. There is also the way the film toys with the character of Tarzan, giving him the human instincts that he should possess and hinting at his soon to be obvious journey of self-discovery. During the course of the opening, Tarzan will invent the knife and he will upgrade it to a spear when he attaches a stick to it thus leaving behind the 'gorilla' method of merely climbing and reaching for fruit during a food gathering montage instead of using initiative and inventing something to tackle the situation. Tarzan will also use his man advantages to defeat a threat to the clan further emphasising his superiority over the strongest gorilla, Kerchak (Henriksen).
But the film suffers from not only those things that hold back a Disney film when it comes to issues of equality, but also things of a film making nature. Firstly, the film has a problem with the space in which the characters inhabit, frequently ignoring logic and substituting it for laughs  since the film does not have a 'genie' or a set of cutlery or a 'Timon and Pumbaa' to get across the laughs that kids and some adults will enjoy, it needs to have Tarzan and Jane surfing down tree trunks; flying uncontrollably through the air and landing ridiculously safely as well as a bizarre and somewhat out of place chase involving a hoard of baboons. Not only this but Disney's now obligatory issues of representation creep in; I may have let them slide previously but when I am apart of the targeted group, I take offence. The English sailors are perceived as conniving and are somewhat evil  there are 'good' sailors but they are never presented and do not have a lot of screen time. Furthermore, Jane and her father come across as rather inept and innocent in their bumbling and comic antics. This is also the reason Tarzan's blood parents do not speak because they too are 'good' English characters.
Then there are the other characters. The gorillas and Tarzan himself are all American with Tarzan's best friend Terk bizarrely adopting a Brooklyn accent; Tarzan's mother and Kerchak are also American and are put across as good people  no coincidence that the American gorillas all have morals and established ways of living before the interfering Europeans arrive with their big ideas. But if you delve deep enough into the Earth, you will destroy it as you will reach the core  Tarzan is still enjoyable and Phil Collins presents a great soundtrack. The premise may be cute and the execution equally so, but this is not a strong effort as the weak and anticlimactic final third would confirm.