Carry on Up the Jungle
A film review by Graeme Huggan
Copyright 1998
What many have called 'one of the lesser Carry on movies', this spoof on Tarzan movies is all about the expedition in search of a long-lost son and the rare oozalum bird. Lady Evelyn Bagley (Joan Sims) lost her husband and her son many years ago in the jungle. She decides to return to that same jungle area to try and find out what happened to them. Also on the expedition are Professor Inigo Tinkle (Frankie Howerd) and Claude Chumley (Kenneth Connor) who are in search of the oozalum bird. Aiding them is expert hunter and poacher Bill Boosey (Sid James) and local guide/ head of tribe Upsidasi (Bernard Bresslaw). After searching for days in the blinding sun, they find the oozalum bird and also have to escape from a gorilla. Furthermore, they lose Bagley's assistant June (Jacki Piper) who decides to stay with her new found friend 'Tarzan' (Terry Scott). When Lady Bagley catches sight of him one night, she knows that he is her long-lost baby! Before she can acquaint herself with him, the whole expedition is captured by an all-woman tribe Aphrodisia led by Tonka (Charles Hawtrey) who decide to use the men to further populate their tribe. When Lady Bagley discovers that Tonka is her long-lost husband and Tonka falls from power, their only hope of escape is to be rescued by Tarzan and June! There are good performances from Joan Sims as the upper-crust lady on expedition and Frankie Howerd as prude Inigo (a part originally meant for Kenneth Williams, but due to his work commitments, was given to Howerd). Valerie Leon is entertaining as Leda, the eventual leader of Aphrodisia, and Terry Scott and Jacki Piper's partnership works well. On the other hand, Sid James' part is useless as is Kenneth Connor's part as Chumley. They are only in the movie to make up the number of regulars. Furthermore, Bernard Bresslaw suffers in the mundane part of Upsidasi. The small part of Tonka is well-suited to Charles Hawtrey. As leader of an all-woman tribe, he is hilarious. Similarly, the flashback to when he got lost in the jungle with little 'baby-waby' is very amusing. However, apart from a very very brief appearance at the start, he does not enter the movie until after sixty minutes duration. This Carry on suffers from some very poor parts and some weak performances (Connor and James). There are very poor production values as the whole film was made in the Pinewood studios and so the jungle looks terrible. The oozalum bird is ridiculously tacky and cheap! The jokes are getting very repititive by this stage and the absence of so many regulars (due to the need for only the characters of Bagley, Tonka, Tarzan and Tinkle) illustrates how basic the story is. Even so, this Carry on is entertaining and is not the worst of its kind.
My rating:- 2.5 out of 5 stars.
Written by Graeme Huggan.
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