Film

Tarzan and His Mate

Name: Tarzan and His Mate
Genre: Action, Adventure
Released: 1934
Cast: Johnny Weissmüller, Maureen O'Sullivan, Neil Hamilton, Paul Cavanagh, Forrester Harvey

Treasure hunt

A 1934 adventure that finds Tarzan navigating the arrival of outsiders to his jungle world. Johnny Weissmüller moves through the frame with genuine physicality, and the film treats the wilderness as genuinely dangerous rather than a theme park. It's a creature of its era—the moral attitudes haven't aged well—but the action sequences have a kinetic energy that still grabs you. For anyone who likes their adventure stories rooted in actual stunt work and practical effects.

TMDb rating

3.3

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you enjoy old-fashioned jungle adventure told with a grown-up sheen, where the lush African setting, the swooping romance between Tarzan and Jane, and the sheer gleeful spectacle of 1930s studio filmmaking do most of the talking.

Skip it if you need modern pacing or sharp characterisation, since the plot is loose, the dialogue creaky, and the film leans on its look and its animals rather than on tight storytelling.

What it asks of you: It runs about an hour and forty-five minutes at an easy, unhurried clip, so settle in for a leisurely ride with broad strokes rather than close attention to any single character's inner life.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

King Kong1933

Released the year before, this shares the same pulp-adventure DNA and similar locations. The special effects and scale are astounding, and it asks similar questions about civilization colliding with untamed nature.

But Stop-motion fight scenes, while revolutionary, don't move as fluidly as live-action. The pacing drags in the middle act.

The Jungle Book1967

Disney's animated adaptation captures that same sense of a man finding belonging in the wilderness, with genuine warmth between its leads. The adventure is lighter but the emotional core is there.

But It's a cartoon from the '60s, so if you're after live-action spectacle and physical danger, this trades that for charm and songs.

Captains Courageous1937

Another adventure with practical action and a man learning to survive in a hostile world, shot with similar technical mastery. The relationship between the leads carries real weight.

But It's set at sea rather than in jungle, so the landscape feels entirely different. Shorter on spectacle, longer on character.

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Tarzan and His Mate

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Venom1981

Both are about the collapse of civilization's authority when it enters terrain that doesn't recognize its rules.

A tense siege film where civilized people invade a confined space and the wilderness—in this case, a Black Mamba and the claustrophobic house it shares with them—becomes the real antagonist. Like Tarzan flipped: the jungle wins by staying still.

But It's a 1981 thriller with Klaus Kinski and Sterling Hayden, not an action film. Slow, poisonous, deliberately uncomfortable in ways adventure films aren't.

The Adventures of Robin Hood1938

Technicolor swashbuckling with stunt performers doing impossible things and a real antagonist worth watching. The action feels alive in a way that predates most modern choreography.

But It's intentionally lighter in tone, playing for laughs alongside the excitement. If you want darkness and danger, you won't find much.

Jungle Jim1948

Johnny Weissmüller returns to the jungle in an even more straightforward adventure serial. Same physicality, same love of practical location shooting, same unapologetic pulp energy.

But It's cheaper and faster than Tarzan and His Mate, which shows. The story is thinner and the production values visibly lower.

The Scarlet Pimpernel1934

Released the same year, it shares the era's technical mastery and commitment to actual stunt work. A man operating in the margins between civilization and danger, using intelligence and physicality.

But The French Revolution setting is entirely urban and political. If you came for jungle and wildlife, this won't scratch that itch.

She1935

Another expedition into the unknown with actual location photography and a sense of genuine discovery. The supporting cast creates real friction and moral complexity.

But The female lead is ethereal and mysterious in ways that feel increasingly dated. The climax is philosophically muddled.

The Last of the Mohicans1932

A frontier adventure with similar DNA: a man of nature caught between worlds, action rooted in real horsemanship and swordplay, and a wilderness that's beautiful and lethal.

But It's more historically grounded and less fantastical, which some might find slower. The romance is secondary to the politics.

Trader Horn1931

An actual African-set adventure with location shooting in Kenya. It has the same sense of exploration and danger, shot by people who went there to film it.

But The racism is structural and ugly in ways that even Tarzan manages to sidestep. It's genuinely difficult to watch as a contemporary viewer.

Embrace of the Serpent2015

Tarzan from the jungle's perspective: a white man's fantasy of belonging, but the film asks what that fantasy costs the people who actually live there.

A black-and-white journey upriver with an indigenous guide and a Western explorer, shot in the Amazon itself. It's a fever dream of an adventure film—gorgeous, strange, and more interested in what the jungle knows than what it contains.

But It's a slow, meditative film from Colombia with minimal plot. If you want excitement, this is contemplative and difficult in every way.

The Mosquito Coast1986

The dark inversion: what happens when the man who loves the jungle is broken, and the jungle becomes a prison rather than home.

Harrison Ford as a man who abandons civilization for the jungle, but his Tarzan fantasy is a descent into megalomania and abuse. It's a psychologically complex deconstruction of the exact myth Tarzan and His Mate celebrates.

But It's deeply uncomfortable and bleak, with no catharsis or adventure-story satisfaction. Watching it is like being trapped in a cage with someone's delusion.