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DISNEY

MOVIE INFO
Director:
Steve Loter
Cast:
Michael T. Weiss, Olivia d'Abo, Jeff Bennett, Jim Cummings, John O'Hurley, Kevin Michael Richardson, Tara Strong, April Winchell
Screenplay:
Various

MPAA:
Rated G.

DVD DETAILS
Presentation:
Widescreen 1.66:1/16x9
Audio:
English Dolby Digital 5.1
French Dolby Digital 5.1
Subtitles:
English
Closed-captioned

Runtime: 75 min.
Price: $29.99
Release Date: 7/23/2002

Bonus:
• “Build Your Own Tree House” Game
• “Tarzan & Jane’s Adventure Builder”
• Mandy Moore “Singing to the Song of Life”


PURCHASE
DVD

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EQUIPMENT
Sony 36" WEGA KV-36FS12 Monitor; Sony DA333ES Processor/Receiver; Panasonic CV-50 DVD Player using component outputs; Michael Green Revolution Cinema 6i Speakers (all five); Sony SA-WM40 Subwoofer.

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Tarzan & Jane (2002)

Reviewed by Colin Jacobson

Time for some more direct-to-video (DTV) fun with Disney! At this point, it simply seems like a matter of time before a theatrical film from Disney animation receives the small-screen sequel treatment. Yeah, flicks like Mulan and A Bug’s Life haven’t gotten DTV editions yet, but it won’t surprise me if such sequels eventually appear.

Now we find an extension of 1999’s hit Tarzan. The studio’s top-grossing cel-animated film since 1994’s The Lion King, the continuing adventures of its lead characters leave open plenty of room for more fun. Too bad little fun shows up in Tarzan & Jane, the movie’s bland DTV sequel.

Like this year’s Cinderella II: Dreams Come True, Jane provides no real central plot. Instead, it consists of three different stories organized around a theme. As the jungle couple’s first anniversary approaches, Jane (voiced by Olivia D’Abo) tries to plan a celebration. She chats with Terk the gorilla (April Winchell) and Tantor the elephant (Jim Cummings) as they remember various experiences over the prior year.

Entitled “British Invasion”, in the first of these some old friends of Jane’s from England come to visit. They disdain her lack of civilization, and Tarzan tries to fit in with this group as he dons formal clothes for the first time. As the ladies picnic, some nasty felines chase them and they get lost in the jungle. Tarzan (Michael T. Weiss) searches for them, and all ends up happily as the women come to appreciate Jane’s new lifestyle.

For the second tale - the blandly titled “Volcanic Diamond Mine” - some opportunists arrive in the jungle. Johannes Niels (John O’Hurley) and his scummy associate Merkus (Cummings) come to cart away as many diamonds as they can carry. However, they need a guide to lead them to the site of these jewels: a local volcano. They hire Tarzan for the task; he accepts just because he believes that Jane wants a big diamond ring, so he agrees to accept a single gem as payment.

Of course, things go poorly. Niels and Merkus just plan to use Tarzan and then dispose of him, but when the volcano turns out to be active, they require his assistance to survive. Much action and adventure ensues.

For “Flying Ace”, the final tale, Jane’s childhood friend Bobby Canler (Jeff Bennett) arrives in his biplane, allegedly on a mission mandated by the queen of England. Tarzan immediately becomes suspicious of Bobby, but Jane and her father Dr. Porter (Bennett) seem excited to see their old companion. Since Tarzan refuses to interact with Bobby, he and Jane fight, and she believes he simply feels threatened and jealous.

Inevitably, Bobby quickly shows his true stripes as he eagerly searches for an old music box he gave to Jane years ago. Jane accidentally discovers that the music box actually decodes British secret codes and he needs it to sell to England’s enemies. Bobby kidnaps her and Tarzan comes to the rescue.

Compared to Disney’s prior DTV efforts, Tarzan & Jane actually comes across pretty well. However, that stands more as an indictment of the other films. These tend to range from bland but watchable to pretty stinky, and Jane definitely falls in the former category.

On the positive side, Jane includes some fairly well realized action sequences. The three vignettes certainly pour on the adventure, as each includes extended and lively action pieces. None of these seem tremendously invigorating or exciting, but they provide some fun moments.

Some of the artwork also easily surpasses the usual ugly animation seen in DTV affairs. Actually, the three vignettes themselves look surprisingly good. The animation seems fairly stiff, but the visuals come across as vivid and rich. These moments don’t approach feature animation standards, but they look quite solid for the most part.

The visuals decline substantially during the linking sequences in which Jane ponders her anniversary. Those presented good colors but looked much stiffer and awkward. The characters also blended poorly with the backgrounds; actually, they usually seemed like paper dolls placed on the artwork. This becomes especially problematic given the fairly high quality of those backgrounds; they often seemed quite lush and elaborate, which just made the character animation even more flawed.

Still, the project maintains a quality stronger than most other DTV fare I’ve watched, and it seems more enjoyable as well. Unlike most of its siblings, however, it includes none of the original film’s voice talent in their prior roles. No Tony Goldwyn as Tarzan, no Minnie Driver, no Rosie O’Donnell, no Wayne Knight - no anybody! No other Disney DTV flick that related to a modern movie failed to obtain at least one original cast member; even Buzz Lightyear of Star Command landed Tim Allen, and most of the others used multiple returning actors.

Because of that fact, it seems surprising that Tarzan & Jane is probably my second favorite of the Disney direct-to-video movies I’ve seen; only the fairly winning Buzz tops it. That remains faint praise. I rate Jane so highly among this crowd because so many of the others are terrible, while this one’s merely mediocre. After dreck like Cinderella II and The Hunchback of Notre Dame II, I’ll happily take mediocre, however.

Trivia note: Seinfeld fans may recognize the voice of Niels. John O’Hurley played J. Peterman on that show. Ironically, that character also traveled the world in search of goods, though he wasn’t quite as evil as the Disney baddie.


The DVD Grades: Picture A- / Audio B- / Bonus D-

Tarzan & Jane appears in an aspect ratio of approximately 1.66:1 on this single-sided, dual-layered DVD; the image has been enhanced for 16X9 televisions. Disney rarely release bad-looking animated DVDs, and Jane offered yet another visual winner.

Sharpness consistently appeared excellent. A lot of these “direct-to-video” offerings tend to seem soft and fuzzy in wide shots just due to the cheapness of the animation. While Jane looked cheesy, it still maintained good clarity and accuracy at all times; the movie stayed nicely crisp and detailed from start to finish. Jagged edges and moiré effects caused no concerns, and I saw no signs of edge enhancement. Print flaws also appeared non-existent; I never detected any issues related to source defects.

Jane boasted a nicely vivid and lush palette. The jungle setting offered many different hues, and the movie replicated these with excellent life and spark; the colors seemed vibrant and lively. Black levels also appeared deep and rich, while shadow detail was appropriately thick but not overly dense or opaque. Tarzan & Jane lost a few points due to the lackluster of much of the film’s animation itself, but the quality of the reproduction seemed terrific.

Tarzan & Jane provided a decent but unspectacular Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack. Although the jungle environment should offer plenty of opportunities for environmental effects, the mix remained fairly heavily anchored in the forward channels. In that domain, the front speakers displayed decent spread to the sides. Effects presented moderate atmospheric presence, while music showed nice stereo imaging. Elements panned across the speakers decently well, though these occasionally seemed a little awkward.

The surrounds contributed little more than general reinforcement, as they added some music and environmental ambience. They played a fairly passive role in the proceedings, though they picked up during the third story; it offered some pretty solid split surround usage and movement when the airplane entered the film.

Audio quality seemed acceptable but lacked much life. Speech was intelligible and failed to display any edginess or other concerns, and most of the lines appeared reasonably natural and distinct. Music seemed clean and bright, but dynamics didn’t come across very well; bass response usually remained fairly tepid. The same held true for the effects. Those sounded moderately thin and metallic, and they usually didn’t convey a lot of depth. Occasionally I heard some good punch from the low-end domain, but much of the mix remained flat and tinny. Most of the bass came from the stomping of Tantor the elephant. The audio of Tarzan & Jane appeared good enough to merit a “B-“, but it didn’t do much for me as a whole.

Tarzan & Jane includes only a few supplements. Build Your Own Tree House requires you to assemble that abode via a series of different components; you must choose them in the correct order to succeed. Once you construct the outer building, you go inside and decorate the joint via the same procedures. Successful completion results in no reward. Without that carrot, the game itself seems too dull to merit much attention.

Tarzan & Jane’s Adventure Builder appears a little more entertaining. This storybook presentation lets the viewer select the occasional alternative to tell a tale. This isn’t a terribly fascinating piece, but at least it provides a livelier affair than the “Tree House” game.

Lastly, the DVD includes a music video for Mandy Moore’s performance of “Singing to the Song of Life”. Actually, it’s not much of a video. The 107-second clip combines some shots from the recording studio, clips from the film, and soundbites from Moore. Bland song, boring presentation.

When you start the DVD, you’ll find the usual complement of advertisements. Here we get a preview of the upcoming theatrical release Treasure Planet as well as commercials for the video issues of Mickey’s House of Villains, The Rookie, Monsters Inc., and Beauty and the Beast. From the main menu, you’ll discover a Sneak Peeks area that includes trailers for all of the above plus the upcoming DVD releases of Teamo Supremo, Rolie Polie Olie: The Great Defender of Fun, 101 Dalmatians II: Patch’s London Adventure and Schoolhouse Rock.

Compared to other Disney “direct-to-video” movies, Tarzan & Jane shines and seems like a winner. However, compared to almost every theatrical animated film released by the studio, it comes across as fairly crude, stilted and bland. The DVD offers excellent picture with passable but often thin sound and only a few weak extras. If you enjoy Disney’s DTV work, you should enjoy this one, but others will likely want to skip this watchable but generally uncompelling movie.

Viewer Film Ratings: 3.826 Stars Number of Votes: 23
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22:
51:
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