OUR STORY SO FAR: Cliffhanger serials, as a general rule, obtained their name by ending each chapter with a “cliffhanger”: a predicament that placed the hero or heroine in such peril that the moviegoer would be forced to return to the theater the following week to see how they managed to escape. More often than not, the new chapter would begin with a brief recap of last week’s thrills and then you would see the protagonist emerge scot-free from the danger…usually by the re-editing with footage that you could have sworn wasn’t there the week before (and later when serials started getting released on VHS and DVD, you learned it wasn’t—thus branding chapter play endings with egregious violations of serial protocol the epithet “cheats”).
Universal Studios did their serials a bit differently. As Chapter 3 begins, we learn from non-essential characters in this production of the fate that has befallen the good guys…for example, after a title credit reminds us it’s “1939 – in Germany” (and we watch generous stock footage of the German war machine on parade in the streets of Berlin) we reacquaint ourselves with the Nazi swine we were introduced to as Chapter 1 got underway—the guy with the gi-normous ashtray…
…who is also doodling a skull-and-crossbones on his notepad. Then Herr Heel Clicker arrives to tell his commanding officer that he has a phone message by radio from Tambosa:
And in a dissolve, we find faux botanist Dr. Elise Bork (Tala Birell) and her weaselly stooge Denker (Walter Bonn) welcoming their Employee of the Month, the insidious agent known only as Lang (Douglass Dumbrille):
BORK: Mr. Lang…my expert on never getting what Germany
LANG: I’m glad my superior appreciates me…
BORK: I’ve just told Berlin
LANG: You can tell Berlin
BORK: Indeed?!!
“Yeah, so just get off my back!” It is Lang who picks up the phone to make the call to Berlin
WEBER: Go ahead, Lang…
LANG: Pamela Courtney, who was sent by London…to persuade her uncle, Alan Courtney to investigate our murder of Tonga…the judge of the tribe…will be sacrificed tonight by the Tongghili…
And in that one awkward sentence, I’ve brought you up to speed on what you need to know. (Because that whole hungry crocodile danger—you don’t find out what happened with that until six minutes into this chapter.) Speaking of crocodiles (smooth as glass), the scene shifts back to that little barbecue the Tongghili are throwing, which has been kicked off in high style with their trussing up Pamela Courtney (Lois Collier) to a pair of steaks…er, stakes. The man in charge of the native rabble (and who’s secretly in league with the Nazi villains), renegade Tongghili Maati (Napoleon Simpson), tells the perspiring Pamela: “When the fire goes out—Karka will come up the steps…” Her friends will be of little help (not that we didn’t already dope that one out) because his men will kill them—since “I want Lothel, Queen of the Jungle, to be my friend.” (Aw…the big lug’s just lonely…)
Pamela’s “friends” in this little jungle adventure are a couple of derelicts from the U.S. of A.—Bob Elliot (Edward Norris) and his eternally useless sidekick Chuck Kelly (Eddie Quillan). At the present time, they’re wandering around the jungle trying to locate Pamela’s whereabouts…assisted by a woman in white (Ruth Roman) who’s constantly telling the natives “I am Lothel!” as if the Tongghili developed short-term memory loss. Lothel is considered by the Tongghili to be “the Queen of the Jungle” since she shows up every now and then during their ceremonies to offer cryptic advice…and I suppose we’re left with the impression that Lothel is an omniscient and all-powerful jungle entity from the way everyone talks about her. This fails to explain why in one scene of this chapter she screams bloody murder when she encounters a leopard. (To be honest, the way she’s dressed she looks like a choir member who got separated from the rest of her group.)
LOTHEL: A leopard smelled the blood of a wounded Tongghili trader… (To Bob and Chuck) The English girl is in great danger…come!
Lothel leads our “heroes” to the natives’ stronghold where they witness Pamela being cooked over an open flame as hungry crocs approach. Chuck demonstrates his incredible powers of the obvious by commenting: “I guess she ain’t a Nazi after all.” “We’ve got to save her, Chuck,” his friend Bob says in steely-jawed fashion. So the two of them take off towards the camp, and “Jungle Queen” Lothel goes back in the other direction, presumably to hook up with the rest of the choir.
Meanwhile, having spotted Lothel running around the jungle and screaming like a girl, Noma (Emmett Smith) and some of the other Tongghili run back to base camp to report what they saw to Maati:
NOMA: Maati! Lothel helped the girl’s two friends! They’re not Lothel’s enemies!
MAATI: But…Lothel warned us against strangers in the middle jungle…
NOMA: Lang is also a stranger…he wants these people killed! She doesn’t!
MAATI: The Tongghili will listen to Lothel…they will blame me if she is angry…the girl must live!
Hooray! The girl lives! Maati tells Pamela that he will present her to Godac (Clinton Rosemond)—“He is our judge”—but Bob and Chuck have other plans, namely to set fire to the village in order to create a diversion and help Pam escape. Having been cut loose, Pam hauls ass and elbows through the village…followed by Bob and Chuck, who are turn being chased by a few natives who weren’t quite on board with their plan to destroy their village in order to save it.
BOB (yelling): Pamela! Pam Courtney!
PAMELA (she stops as Bob and Chuck catch up to her): Bob! Chuck! I thought you were killed!
BOB: The Tongghili didn’t quite make it…
CHUCK: They tried hard enough!
Not nearly as hard as I would have liked…
BOB: We started those fires thinking that the confusion would give us a chance to save you…
PAMELA: Maati, the chief, cut me loose…said he was going to take me to Godac…
CHUCK: Ooh…I wouldn’t want to meet either of those birds…
BOB: There’s one way of making sure we won’t…
“Let’s get more gasoline and really turn this place into an inferno!” Honestly, the way these two idiots are gleeful about torching a village you’d think they had a callous disregard for human life (um…fellas…there may have women and children there?)—almost like their enemies! (Irony can be pretty ironic sometimes.)
It is morning. And Maati is getting a dressing down from the Nazi known as Lang.
LANG: You let that English girl and those Americans escape because you’re afraid of Lothel…
MAATI: The Tongghili like Lothel very much…
LANG: You can’t be my friend and Lothel’s too…
This is starting to take on the dynamics of a high school study hall.
MAATI: I want Lothel to make me the judge…
LANG: Sure, Maati, sure…that’s why she chose Kyba…
MAATI: She thinks I’m not her friend…but I’ll show her that I am!
(Maati reaches for his knife, but Lang is a little quicker on the draw, brandishing a pistol.) You shoot that and Noma will come with the warriors…
LANG: Sit down, Maati…now suppose I fix it so the Tongghili will not like your mystery queen…
MAATI: You do that and I’ll kill the English girl and the Americans before they leave the jungle…
LANG: Fair enough…I’ve been planning that stunt ever since you told me how the judge was chosen…
We then dissolve to our heroes’ camp, as Bob and Chuck are packing up their gear and Pamela exits the cave:
PAMELA: You should have let me sleep so long, boys!
BOB: You needed it!
PAMELA: Isn’t that a polite way of saying you didn’t want me to stand watch?
“It’s a dumb way of not thinking far enough ahead that you could have been fixing our breakfast if you were the first one up…”
CHUCK: Well…after all, Pam…
PAMELA (interrupting) You didn’t know if I was really Pam Courtney or a Nazi…isn’t that it?
BOB: Well, we thought you were leading us into a trap…we knew better when we saw you tied to that stake…
“So the natives tied her up to be served as a crocodile snack…damn, those Nazis are clever!”
PAMELA: I didn’t trust you either…that’s why I was letting you take me to Tambosa!
BOB: You mean you really know where your uncle’s camp is?
PAMELA: Of course!
You see, it was all a simple misunderstanding! They did this on Three’s Company one time, in that episode where Jack mistook Mrs. Roper for Ilsa, She Wolf of the SS.
PAMELA: Are you American agents sent to help him?
BOB: Oh, no, no, no…we’re American volunteers…I heard about this trouble here through a friend of mine in Washington
Kind of gives you an indication of how seriously the U.S.
CHUCK: Why Nazis want to play marbles for keeps with anyone in this wilderness is still beyond me!
PAMELA: Well, control the Judge who rules the middle jungle tribes…and through him, you pretty well control a large region in Africa …
CHUCK: Sure, sure…but why would England Washington
Chuck, buddy…if you keep picking at the threads of this plot this serial is going to unravel faster than you can say “Nyoka and the Tigermen.” That’s when Pamela shows her pals the mysterious clothing label mentioned in Chapter 1:
PAMELA: That label is connected in some way with the murder of Tonga
CHUCK: Nazis wearing American clothes, huh?
BOB: Or…Nazi spies who took out their citizenship papers to hide their German origin!
Or…Nazis are really sharp dressers!
PAMELA: I suggest you let me guide you to my uncle…he knows more about the Tongghili than anyone else…
CHUCK: Does he know this mysterious jungle queen who saved us?
BOB (grabbing his gear): I doubt it…
PAMELA: So do I…Lothel seems to have arrived here just about the same time we did…
BOB: All right, Pam…lead the way!
I didn’t notice this last week—but every time they shift the scene to Dr. Bork’s hideout they run the same stock footage of her pulling up in a Woody. (I guess she’s the one who gets stuck getting the groceries all the time.) Anyway, Lang and Denker are inside the house when they hear Bork’s ride pulling in:
DENKER: The Fraulein Doctor…she has come to ask questions…
LANG: I think my answers will please even her…
“And if not…dim the lights and pour us some wine, Denker…and then let’s let nature take its course…heh heh heh…” While Lang monkeys around with a sort of plunger detonator, Bork enters the room.
BORK: Well, Lang…how ‘bout it?
LANG: I think I'll get enough fire out of the volcano to get the effect we want…
DENKER: It’s due to erupt anyway…
BORK: I hope it does…so much the better!
LANG: The TNT I’ve already planted may encourage an eruption…but no explosion will ever start one…
My! He’s been a busy little vandal…hasn’t he?
BORK: What about Pamela Courtney…and the two Americans?
LANG: Her trail has been discovered…they’re going deeper into the jungle…
BORK: Indeed…hunting for the girl’s uncle, no doubt…
LANG: She’ll never speak to him…they should be near the volcano tonight…tomorrow, Maati will capture them—and blame whatever happens on them!
Lang then pushes down the plunger with a dramatic flourish, and the scene shifts to…
Thanks…by the way—I don’t know if you can tell from this screen capture…
…but I love the guy beating out the rhythm on the stretched out thing-a-jig—he looks like he’s wearing a pair of oven mitts.
GODAC: I am your Judge! The secret that I know about this sword (holds it up) is my power…only my successor can share the secret…
Strong enough for a man—but made for a woman.
GODAC: Kyba…I will tell it to you…
(Kyba starts to approach Judge Godac, but is interrupted by Maati…)
MAATI: Does Kyba have the approval of the Gods?
GODAC: Do you want Kyba to go to the Mountain of Fire
MAATI: The Tongghili can demand that Kyba take the test…let him go to the Mountain tonight!
Well, what if Kyba (Clarence Muse) hasn’t studied? Actually, why go to the Mountain of Fire
LOTHEL: The Mountain of Fire
MAATI: I do not question the fire that Tongu, our founder, worshipped… (Pointing towards Godac) Tongu, the sword you bear!
LOTHEL: Godac! Strangers went in the ruin temples of the mountains! Who plan to slay one of your pupils!
MAATI: Last night she said it was strangers from the sacrifice to Karka! A village burned! She is a stranger also!
“From now on/All my friends/Are gonna be strangers…” The Jungle Queen then reminds her subjects: “I am Lothel!” (That’s what she said, she said that, that’s what the jungle queen said…) “I come only to help you! Kyba—do not go!” Told by Orbon (Jim Basquette) that “Godac, our Judge, will decide” the lady Lothel disappears back into the hot room as an ominous gong sounds.
GODAC (to Kyba): Go to the mountain…if its flames do not erupt tonight, you are worthy…and I shall tell you the secret of the sword tomorrow…
And with that, Kyba the fool runs off in the direction of a live volcano. (Schmuck.) We now take you to the location of “the flaming mountain,” where Lang is making his last minute preparations to blow it up real good.
LANG: Oh, take it easy, Maati…
MAATI: Are you sure?
LANG: You’ll be the judge alike by this time tomorrow…
MAATI: As soon as Godac tells me the secret of the sword, I will kill Godac…
LANG: That’s the general idea…
MAATI: Then I’ll be the Judge…
“Here come de…”—no, let’s not go there. Lang and Maati are then interrupted by Noma, who informs that “Kyba has gone to the old temple—he’s there now…” Pushing down the plunger, the diabolical Lang gloats: “Now the Ancient Gods will tell Kyba what they think of him!”
The detonation starts the volcano’s eruption in motion. Inside the temple, Kyba is surprised to see Lothel:
KYBA: You break our tribal laws to come here…
LOTHEL: I come to plead with you…leave this temple, Kyba!
KYBA: If there is danger here for me…it is my destiny!
LOTHEL: The voices of your Ancient Gods are stilled…strangers are here!
Looking out through an opening in the temple, Kyba can see the volcano is starting to do with volcanoes do best…and takes a large crap in his native pants. “I am condemned!” he cries out…but when he turns around to confront the Jungle Queen, he sees that Lothel has done what the smart money has bet on and got the hell out of the temple.
In the jungle, Bob, Chuck and Pamela watch from a distance even though Bob admits they’re “much too close for comfort.” “If it ain’t one thing in this jungle, it’s another…first, we crash in a plane…then natives try to feed us to crocodiles…now the mountain blows its top!” I’ll bet Bob is wishing he left Chuck at home. (I know I do.) Annnnd…cue the Jungle Queen!
LOTHEL: This time I come to you for help…
BOB: We’re under obligation to you…
LOTHEL: You must save Godac’s successor…if Kyba dies, your enemies will rule the middle jungle! Come!
BOB (to Chuck and Pamela): You two hike back over the farthest ridge…
CHUCK (to Pamela as they start to leave): Queenie sure gets around, don’t she!
Yeah, Bob—let’s place Chuck out of harm’s way so he can live on for another chapter and prolong the audience’s misery.
L-A-V-A… As the jungle animals also scamper out of their environs because they know where they’re a-gonna go when the volcano blows (“Mr. Utley!”), the stoically stupid Kyba continues to stay put in the temple. Lothel and Bob arrive in time to see Kyba in his little temple room, the floor covered with rubble:
BOB: Lothel wants you to come with me, Kyba!
KYBA: Lothel is a stranger like you…I obey the Gods!
Yeah? Well, in case you haven’t picked up on this, Kybe…the Gods are telling you to run fast, run far! The rubble continues to fall from the crumbling temple as Kyba and Bob wrestle (Kyba is trying to knife Bob) and Lothel helplessly looks on. Meanwhile, a nostalgia blogger sadly starts to question why he wandered into this serial in the first place…
Hahaha he's so bad even his doodles are evil! Hilarious.
ReplyDeleteNazis are pretty swank, so I'm not sure their so-called clue is all that helpful.