This week’s pick is one that I’ve sadly never seen. Proving that film franchises have been around since the beginning of movies, Tarzan, The Ape Man was the first of twelve Tarzan films starring Johnny Weismuller as Tarzan. These films were hugely popular in the 30 & 40s and continued to spawn additional films in the Tarzan franchise well into the 60s and early 70s.

Even if you’ve never seen any of them (I haven’t), you are sure to have heard the famous Tarzan yell. Weismuller claimed to have developed that yell at a yodeling competition he won when he was a boy. In actuality it was created by early sound recording engineer, Douglas Shearer, using a recording of an Austrian yodeler that was sped up and reversed. Weismuller eventually became so good at mimicking the sound that most people believed he was providing the sound for the films. (source: wikipedia)

Tarzan, The Ape Man (1932) – Saturday, May 22 at 4:15pm EST
A British lord raised by apes kidnaps a beautiful noblewoman exploring Africa with her father.
Cast: Johnny Weissmuller, Neil Hamilton, C. Aubrey Smith, Maureen O’Sullivan Dir: W. S. Van Dyke BW-100 mins, TV-G