Jungle Man (aka Drums of Africa)

The cover of this DVD said Jungle Man, but the title card in the movie itself claimed that it was Drums of Africa. I'm not sure what the deal is, but it's not worth trying to figure out.

Whatever it's called, it's about an hour long, but half of that is filled with randomly insterted stock footage of animals. The other half-hour is about a party of rich folks who go to Africa to photograph some "lost" ruins called the City of the Dead. The group is made up of a young cad named Bruce, his best friend Andy, Bruce's fiancé Betty, and Betty's dad. Betty and her dad aren't invited at first, but Betty whines about her boring life until Bruce and her dad cave. Her dad's a pitiful, spineless guy who not only gives in to Betty constantly; he also lets himself get dragged along on her "adventure."

Dad's got a brother though who's a missionary in Africa not far from where the City is supposed to be, so the group hires a worse-than-useless guide (he's supposed to be funny, but he's actually stupid, annoying, and dangerous) and goes to find Betty's uncle. When they get there, they also meet a handsome doctor who's using the mission as a lab from which he's trying to cure a local, but deadly plague. And the reverend missionary has a pet tiger that he's named Satan for some reason. I'm thinking that maybe he's not as pious as he appears. Either that or he really hates that cat.

The Reverend and Doctor warn Bruce and Andy against trying to find the City. No one's ever returned alive, etc., etc. Oh, but you need to know how to get there? Here, even though I've never been to the City myself, I'll draw you a very detailed map.

I'd like to tell you that I won't spoil the ending as a matter of courtesy, but honestly it's because I'm already bored just thinking about the rest of the movie. There's no way I'm going to take the time to type it out.

The only notable thing about the film is that it stars Buster "Flash Gordon" Crabbe and Charles "Ming the Merciless" Middleton as Doc Hammond and Reverend Graham. They're not bad actors and Crabbe is even more charismatic here than he is in the Flash Gordon movies. It's just too bad that Jungle Man/Drums of Africa is mostly about Betty and Bruce, so neither Crabbe nor Middleton has anything interesting to do.