Burroughs' tale gets an Avatar twist

Tarzan 3D
English (U)
Director: Reinhard Klooss
Cast: Voices of Kellan Lutz, Spencer Locke, Joe Cappelletti and others

Tarzan 3D, Klooss’ adaptation which arrives fifteen years since Disney’s Tarzan (1999), is more like a direct to video, rather than a theatrical version. The animation is reminiscent of decade-old video games, and features Kellan Lutz (Emmett Cullen of The Twilight Saga) as the loin cloth-clad hero, who survives a helicopter crash, which killed his super-rich parents, the Greystokes.

The Greystokes came looking for a meteorite that exterminated the dinosaurs, and for reasons unexplained, the lost space debris packs a lot of power and lies buried in the African jungle.

Tarzan is raised by Kala, a female ape, and is adopted by her clan. Back in the present, Greystoke Energies is run by a diabolic businessman, William Clayton (Cappelletti) who plans to harness the power of the meteorite. Clayton cons Jane Porter (Locke), an ecologist and her father into a jungle expedition so that the meteorite can be found.

Klooss twists a Edgar Rice Burroughs’ jungle tale with a sci-fi plot, and a corporate foe, substituting everything with Avatar (2009)’s elements and some of Hulk (2003). The apes defend their territory, which coincidentally happens to be the same spot where the meteorite is, a human and his love interest support another species against their own and Tarzan dodges the helicopters by swinging from the creepers.

Though there are some merits, such as the top-notch rendering of the jungle by the matte artists and the animated apes, the character animation of humans is raw. In several scenes, Tarzan appears ghostly, that could scare the kids.

There isn’t much to the script and one would rather watch Disney’s Tarzan than this one.