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Tarzan X 1995 (2027)

Is it worth your time? That depends entirely on your tolerance for 90s softcore aesthetics and your ability to laugh at incompetence. As a piece of erotic cinema, it fails – it’s not sexy, it’s awkward. As an action film, it fails – the stunts are pathetic. As a Tarzan adaptation, it’s an insult to the source material.

(1 point for the unintentional comedy, 0.5 for the chimp’s professionalism) tarzan x 1995

The film opens with a young woman, Karen (Angela D’Angelo), searching for her missing anthropologist father in the African jungle. She stumbles upon a wild man known as Tarzan (Rocco Siffredi, legendary adult film star, here billed as "Rocco"), who lives in a treetop paradise with his chimpanzee companion, Cheeta (a real chimp, looking perpetually unimpressed). Tarzan has amnesia – a convenient plot device that allows for endless exposition dumps. He doesn’t know if he’s a lord or a lost city guardian. Is it worth your time

The pacing is glacial. Long stretches of the film involve characters walking through the jungle, Tarzan grunting monosyllabically, or the villains arguing in a poorly decorated cave set. The action scenes are laughably staged: a "fierce" fight with a crocodile involves a man in a rubber suit flopping on the ground, and Tarzan’s famous vine-swinging is reduced to a single, unconvincing shot on a soundstage. As an action film, it fails – the stunts are pathetic

However, as a spectacle of failure ? It’s a masterpiece. Tarzan X is the cinematic equivalent of finding a moldy, half-eaten sandwich in a rented VHS case – it’s gross, confusing, and you can’t look away. Rocco Siffredi’s Tarzan may not conquer the jungle or your heart, but he will forever swing awkwardly through the low-rent canopy of bad movie history.

Enter the villains: a group of sleazy treasure hunters led by a man named Mr. X (no relation to the title, or maybe all the relation?), who are searching for a legendary golden idol. Their plan involves capturing Tarzan’s female companion, a scantily clad native woman named Sharmaine (Cindy Leadbetter). What follows is a series of captures, escapes, jungle chases, and – most importantly – frequent, extended softcore interludes.