In a further setback for human/ape relations, Village Roadshow released a new trailer for The Legend of Tarzan on Monday showing a gorilla taking very good care of a human baby. It’s barely been a week since the death of Harambe, and already we’re filling theaters with propaganda about apes raising human babies and humans becoming lords of the jungle. This is not how we keep the Statue of Liberty above-ground, people!
The film is directed by Harry Potter veteran David Yates and stars Alexander Skarsgård as Tarzan and Margot Robbie as Jane. Christoph Waltz and Samuel L. Jackson will be playing actual historical figures. Jackson is George Washington Williams, an American Civil War soldier whose open letter to King Leopold brought the horrors of the Belgian Congo to worldwide attention. Waltz is billed as Captain Rom, who can only be Force Publique head Léon Rom, an avid butterfly collector best known for decorating his flowerbeds with severed heads. (He was reputedly the real-life basis for Conrad’s Kurtz.)
Judging from the trailer, The Legend of Tarzan is scrupulously accurate with matters like friendships between lions and humans and wildebeest stampedes knocking over buildings, so it seems well-positioned to deal sensitively with the legacy of colonialism. Plus, it clearly has the best CGI vine-swinging since Cool Mint Listerine. The film opens July 1, approximately two weeks before the inevitable ape rebellion.
