Jungle Goddess (1948)

"I could sure go for a charbroiled hamburger sammich and some french-fried potatoes.", 24 March 2007

Beyond being a bad, terribly dull movie, I have a bigger problem with Jungle Goddess – racism. I'm not sure why it bothers me so much in this movie when I can let it go in movies with similar racial incidents like any of the Tarzan movies, but it really bothered me here. The characters (an by this I mean the white characters) attitudes toward the shooting of an innocent native is so nonchalant. It's no big deal to any of them. You kill a human being and then have the nerve to feel you're being wronged by the other members of his tribe because they want and expect retribution – it's something my 21st Century sensibilities cannot comprehend. And it's not just the "bad" guy. The "good" characters have the same "no big deal" attitude. I honestly think it bothered me so much in Jungle Goddess because the movie is so bad there's nothing to take the edge of these scenes. The racial attitudes of the 1940s were given the opportunity to stand front and center and show just how repulsive they really were.

Okay, off the soapbox for a bit. As I say, Jungle Goddess is Dull with a capital "D". None of the three main actors (George Reeves, Wanda McKay, and Ralph Byrd) seems capable of displaying any of the realistic emotions you might expect from someone lost in the jungle. In fact, McKay plays it much like a little girl going to a tea party. It's completely unbelievable. Speaking of unbelievable, the sets are some of the worst I've seen. You can find more realistic looking plastic plants at the local Wal Mart. And the stock footage scenes of animals don't help at all. It's all too obvious that the characters are no where near the animals. Add it up – cheap sets, dull script, and uninspired acting make for one very bad movie.

2/10