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Jungle doctor Sturdy's (Carl Benton Reid) surgery has fallen out of
favour with the local native tribe, the Nagassu, after their old chieftain
has died and their witch doctor Futa (James Edwards) has taken over
control of the tribe. This is especially worrying for the doctor's
daughter Ann (Jil Jarmyn), whose fiancé Ken (Harry Lauter) works as doc
Sturdy's assistant.
Enter Tarzan (Gordon Scott), who has just brought Jane (Eve Brent) over
to Sturdy's surgery to be treated for appendicitis, and who tries to make
peace between the medical doctor and the witch doctor - but to no avail,
the witch doctor doesn't trust Tarzan one bit, he even makes Tarzan his
captive (he manages to escape though) and brainwashes Molo (Nick Stewart),
one of Sturdy's aides, so he will go and kill Jane - who is saved only in
the nick of time, by another of the doctor's aides.
The witch doctor has a problem though, his grip on his tribe depends
solely on his ability to keep the old chieftain's son, the young chief,
alive, but the boy is ailing and on the verge of dieing - and Futa has no
real abilities to cure the sick. So his second-in-command Ramu (Woody
Strode) suggests to steal some medicine from the white doctor to cure the
boy, and goes on stealing some ... but accidently, he picks a bottle of
poison.
When Tarzan learns about all of this at the nursery, he rushes back to
the Nagassu village to save the young chieftain, but it might already be
too late, as Futa has already started a ceremony during which the boy is
to be cured/poisoned. Tarzan arrives but in the nick of time, and he banks
on the strong support he still has from many of the tribe's members to
keep Futa from feeding the poison to the chieftain and instead make him
drinking it himself - upon which the witchdoctor dies, and everything is
well again.
After the previous Tarzan film, Tarzan
and the Lost Safari, was shot at least partly in Africa (and
therefore looked unusually convincing), Tarzan's Fight for Life
returned to studio sets, which are of course much easier to handle and
control, but which when shot in colour look even less convincing than when
being shot in black and white. That notwithstanding, Tarzan's Fight for
Life isn't too bad a Tarzan movie, its plot isn't
terribly original but it's believable (in the contest of a Tarzan
film) and moving and improved by many mini-dramas woven into main
storyline (from the subplot of Jane's appendicitis to the doctor's aide
who has a breakdown after having killed Molo). Also, Gordon Scott gives
another solid (if far from great) performance in the title role. The only
thing about the film that's a real turn-off is the introduction of a new
Boy, Rickie Sorensen, as Tarzan and Jane's surrogate son. But fortunately
he's kept rather in the background in this one (not so in the next entry,
the proposed TV-pilot Tarzan
and the Trappers). Oh, and the other thing that's really silly is
chimp Cheetah wearing a loincloth. But apart from that, the film is a
solid entry into the series, even if it's far from being a classic.
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