The Virgin Goddess (Argentina/South Africa, 1974)

Helmed by Dirk De Villiers, a South African director of prolific output but little renown outside his home country, The Virgin Goddess is proof that Argentinian sex bomb Isabel Sarli was more than just a buxom puppet in the hands of her director paramour Armando Bo. Don’t assume, however, that Bo was not close at hand. He shares a co-production credit on the film and also appears in a supporting role. Furthermore, his son, Victor Bo, plays the male lead. Victor, I should mention, would go on to give Armando Bo a grandson, also named Armando Bo, who would grow up to share screenwriting credit on Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu’s Oscar nominated film Birdman. And thus is a membrane-thin veneer of contemporary relevance laboriously attained.

Like so many jungle adventures before it, The Virgin Goddess begins in a modern city, that pinnacle achievement of man in all of his so called “civilization” (but are we really so civilized… ARE WE?). Here, a flinty adventurer—appropriately named Flint and played by director De Villiers himself—regales a table full of sophisticated gentlemen with the story of his latest adventure—in a manner so putatively captivating that, before he is done, the entirety of the patrons and wait staff of the bar they are in has gathered around their table.

Interestingly, Flint’s tale requires a preamble that starts in 1495. It seems a certain, beautiful, monster-titted noblewoman (Sarli) was making a treacherous passage by schooner when a violent storm lead to her being washed up in picturesque dishabille on the shore of some unknown African land (the film was shot in Kruger Park, one of South Africa’s largest game reserves). Because everything that gets left in the jungle—cigarette lighters, old copies of the New Yorker, Jell-O molds—ends up being elevated to the level of a deity, the natives waste no time in scooping Sarli up and making a goddess out of her. And it is at this point that we get the first of many, many travelogue style scenes of natives dancing around and chanting. This provides for lots of National Geographic style nudity, which takes the onus off Sarli, who apparently had some kind of Amy Yip clause in her contract.

Sarli is taken under the wing of the village witch doctor, Makulu (Jimmy Sabe) who acts as her Henry Higgins in terms of teaching her the ins and outs of being a rain goddess. Soon her fevered undulations bring rain. The crops thrive and the village prospers. Meanwhile, Makulu himself has become hoodoo’d by Sarli’s overflowing charms and demands that she become his bride. She refuses, and he puts a curse on her: she will live forever, as will he, as long as she remains a virgin. Makulu, it seems, is running the whole show here, and does so with an iron fist. When a young warrior named Gampu (Ken Gampu) attempts to assassinate him, he ends up being run out of the village and goes into hiding.

The Virgin Goddess is an odd film. Its dialogue is a mix of both spoken and dubbed English and Swahili (and to add to the linguistic chaos, the version I watched had Spanish subtitles). It also, especially in comparison to what Armando Bo—whose mania for Sarli’s attributes seemingly robbed him of all restraint—might have done with this kind of material, comes across as sort of… sedate. The pace is slow but measured, and there is an overall hush that reminds one of those old documentaries where the filmmakers spoke in whispers for fear of riling the natives or causing a rhino stampede. It doesn’t help that, whenever De Villiers cuts to a shot of the surrounding wildlife, the animals appear as if they are about to collapse from boredom.

Like her animal co-stars, the usually lusty Sarli also appears anesthetized, laying back complacently as the natives worship her and carry her around on a palanquin—admittedly, as she well might. It takes the intervention of civilized man, that notorious ruiner of everything, to finally bring her back to her old self. This comes in the form of an exploration party comprised of Flint, handsome devil Mark (Victor Bo), financier Hans (Armando Bo), and Eric (James Ryan), a mustached Chuck Negron look-alike who provides the gratuitous folk music.

The Virgin Goddess does not do a very good job of letting us in on when it has transitioned from the 15th century to the present day, so it comes as a bit of a surprise when Gampu, the outcast warrior previously seen only in flashback, steps forward to offer his services as guide to the explorers. From here, the standard retinue of jungle perils and treacheries commences, as naggingly familiar as the morning alarm clock. Eric reveals himself to be the coward of the group and is killed by a leopard while making an ill-advised run for it. Hans is the backstabbing turncoat, and is fatally bitten by vigilant cobras while trying to steal the tribe’s treasure for himself. Mark is handsome, and immediately falls for Sarli once he spies her fondling her own boobs in the local watering hole. This fateful encounter sets the stage for the cataclysmic fuck that will end the film in a hail of volcanic ash and toppling huts (spoiler).

The Virgin Goddess is not boring, even though it feels as though it should be boring. It is instead mesmerizing; mainly for the oddly somnolent approach it takes to material that, in other hands, would provide for a lot of bombast. Dirk De Villiers, it must be said, is no Armando Bo—and I am startled to find myself admitting that Bo’s over-the-top approach was missed here. Because of that, I will deem The Virgin Goddess a must-see only for Sarli completists, of which the desire-perverting tendencies of the internet guarantees there are some. Others, looking for an introduction to this unique star/director combo, would do best to check out the previously reviewed Fuego. Now that’s a picture, people!

Dara (Pakistan, 1968)

It’s hard to believe that, back in 2010, I spent an entire month watching nothing but jungle adventure movies. This especially because I do not particularly care for jungle adventure movies. You see, readers? Such is the mania that my love for you inspires.

My main take-away from that couch-bound safari of mine was the overwhelming evidence that, of all of the internationally recognized pop culture icons, from Superman to James Bond, the one that the most countries want to lay claim to is Tarzan. Thus we have competing versions of Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Jungle Lord from corners of the globe as far flung as Israel, Indonesia, Egypt and India, to name a few. The trouble is that, rather than simply speaking for itself, that knowledge made me feel duty bound to report to you on whatever new cultural permutation of Johnny Loincloth I stumbled across. Which brings me to Dara, which is doomed -- despite its halfhearted attempts at subterfuge -- to become forever known among you as “Pakistani Tarzan”. (Just ask Turkish Star Wars, whose continued cries of "I have my own name, dammit!" continue to go unheeded.)

Dara is a product of Pakistan’s mainstream, Urdu language film industry based in Lahore – otherwise known as “Lollywood”. That is why it does not, like every Punjabi language Pakistani film I’ve reviewed, star either Sultan Rahi or, like every Pashto language Pakistani film I’ve reviewed, Badar Munir. Who it does star is Nasarullah Butt, a bodybuilder who served simultaneously as both Mr. Asia and Mr. Pakistan from 1954 to 1965 and who is here making his film debut.

Now, if you think that naming Nasarullah Butt’s debut film Dara might constitute a none-too-subtle attempt to create positive associations with a certain other South Asian athlete turned action star, you could be forgiven. Indeed, Butt, besides being of a similar body type, shares with Indian stunt film king Dara Singh -- who, by the way, also played Tarzan -- the signature move of picking up his opponents and twirling them overhead before using them as human missiles. That is, of course, not to deny Butt his own claims to star quality. He is possessed of both brutal good looks and a winning smile and, while perhaps no Olivier, commands the screen with a certain brand of raw charisma.

That Charisma comes in handy, because Dara’s Pakistani Tarzan, named Dara, follows the grand tradition of the majority of movie Tarzans in being dumb as shit. This, of course, does not prevent him from being sexual catnip to every attractive woman who finds herself within pheromone range, of which Dara offers an impressive number. For starters, there is the film’s version of Jane, named Seema (Rani), who, I'm pleased to announce, follows in a grand tradition of South Asian B movie heroines in packing a pistol which she is by no means afraid to use. Next comes jungle girl Sonya, whom Dara repeatedly rescues from the rapey designs of a man whom I will just refer to as Mustache, who is the unscrupulous (and rapey… did I mention rapey?) partner of Seema’s fortune hunter father.

And finally, of course, there is an evil jungle princess (Aliya) who is determined to have the ape man as her own personal boy toy. Unfortunately, like so many jungle princesses before her, she has a nearly Aspergian grasp of the intricacies of courtship. It turns out that tying your love interest and all of his friends to stakes and then singing at them is not the surefire way to spark a lasting romance.

 If that is not a classic "Bitch, please" look that Dara is sporting, I don't know what is.

Yet it is just possible that Seema is even more hormonally addled by Dara’s meaty proximity than is the Princess, as evidenced by a dream sequence that takes place at the film’s midpoint, when Tarzan… I mean Dara… has been presumed dead after a fall from a silly looking miniature bridge. Here Seema awakens in a fog enshrouded netherworld, surrounded by, not just Dara, but a whole host of loincloth clad muscle boys, all perched and flexing atop individual pedestals. She is inspired to song.

Without subtitles, it’s impossible for me to say with any certainty what Seema is singing. But, were I to guess, I would say that it’s an early precursor to Diana Ross’ 80s hit “I Want Muscle”. Long exposure to a well-oiled, mostly naked muscleman has, in his absence, driven Seema into a kind of erotomania that only a small army of such men can now satisfy. Here, as so often before, a Tarzan movie has revealed itself to be really all about unbridled female lust, and this scene, being so close to the heart of the matter, is undeniably Dara’s main attraction.

The funny thing about all of these variously provenanced Tarzan movies -- be they your Daras, your Zimbos, or your Zambos -- is how much they are really just Tarzan movies, with their specific cultural contexts providing very little in the way of detours from the usual formula. As an audience, this reduces us to less engaged spectators than detached observers, waiting in dull eyed resignation for the rolling out of the inevitable.

For starters, there is the standard roll call of boilerplate jungle perils (lions and bears and snakes, oh my!) and the stock footage used to realize them.

(Sorry, fans of quicksand and spiky pits; those two seem to have been either overlooked or ended up on the cutting room floor.)

And then there is the "lost" treasure, which, once found, drives those finding it into a googly eyed lather of cartoonish greed…

…from which skullduggery and backstabbing follows, delivering with them the simplistic rebuke to modernity and “so called” civilization (can we really say who the true savages are? CAN WE?) that we’ve all been waiting for.

Of course, along with the hoary, Dara also boasts those standard Tarzan elements that are every bit as welcome as they are predictable. There are, for instance, silly costumes, such as the Leopardman outfits worn by the evil princess’s guards.

There is also a monkey. Here he is a Capuchin rather than the standard issue chimp, but he nonetheless acquits himself impressively in the field of simian screen heroics. There is one scene where he escapes from the captivity in which he and Dara are being held by the princess’s guards and races for help. Despite the obvious animal cruelty involved, I have to admit that I found the sight of the little guy hauling ass through the jungle with both hands tied behind his back pretty rousing. I am a horrible person.

In the hands of director Aslam Dar, Dara’s virtually surprise-free cocktail of luddism, female libido and pulp histrionics is well mixed, with more than a few stylish touches. This may in fact be the most noirish of the wannabe Tarzans, featuring shadowy deep focus shots and a surfeit of moody lighting. Of course, nothing too radical, mind you. This is Tarzan, after all, and it’s unlikely that Pakistani audiences in 1968 were any more prepared than American ones would have been for the kind of dark reboots of beloved heroes that are all too common today. No, no matter how jungly the perils, our movie must end on a shot of a smiling Tarzan and Jane -- or, in this case, Dara and Seema -- riding off into the sunset on an elephant. And here it comes.