the audience applauded

Absolutely the worst movie.

A lot of fun.

The plot isn't so bad, but the pace of storytelling is too slow which makes people bored. Certain moments are so obvious and unnecessary for the main plot. I would've fast-forwarded those moments if it was an online streaming. The ending looks like implying a sequel, not sure if this movie will get one

Jane, who is away nursing troops in war-torn Europe, sends a letter to Tarzan (Johnny Weissmuller) requesting some of his amazing healing jungle juice, which she believes will help cure soldiers who have contracted tropical diseases.In order to obtain the plants necessary for the marvellous medicine, Tarzan, Boy (Johnny Sheffield) and Cheetah must travel beyond the desert town of Birherari to a perilous patch of jungle full of bizarre and deadly creatures. During their journey, the threesome team up with fast talking and feisty magician Connie Bryce (Nancy Kelly) who is on a covert mission to deliver a message to Prince Saleem of Birherari, warning him that his father's business associate Paul Hendrix (Otto Kruger) has been secretly plotting to take over the country by force.A change of scenery injected a little life back into the Tarzan series when the ape-man went to New York, but here the new locale doesn't work so well: seemingly influenced by his arid and barren surroundings, Wilhelm Thiele's direction for his desert based action—which takes up the majority of the running time—is pretty dry and lifeless, and the film only flourishes when the movie finally moves to the lush jungle setting. Here, we are treated some of the most enjoyably daft moments of the series so far, with the brave ape man and his pals confronting prehistoric creatures (real lizards with 'sails' glued to their backs), a man eating plant, and a massive, thoroughly unconvincing spider that traps Boy in its over-sized web (made from rope); it's just a shame that the good stuff is so brief, and that it's such an arduous trek to get there.I rate Tarzan's Desert Mystery a rather disappointing 5 out of 10 (the hilarious shonky spider almost earned the film another point, but Connie's continuous use of irritating '40s slang stopped me from being so generous).

Tarzan's Desert Mystery (1943) ** (out of 4) Jane, who once again sends Tarzan a letter saying she isn't coming home, also asks her boyfriend to get a secret formula that can cure troops fighting in the war. Tarzan, Boy and Cheetah set out to do this but end up fighting Arabs. I found it incredibly difficult to stay awake while watching this film and it took several viewings to be able to do so. I thought the first forty-minutes of this thing were deadly dull and lacked any nice comedy or action. The female lead also wasn't very interesting, which hurt matters. The film eventually picks up at the end when Tarzan must enter a mysterious jungle full of living vines, prehistoric creatures and a huge spider. If only the entire film had taken place here. This is the first Tarzan I've actually been disappointed in to the point where I probably won't watch it again.

Edger Rice Burrough's Tarzan was never meant to be muscular although as portrayed by Elmo Lincoln, Frank Merrill and Gordon Scott's Tarzan was indeed very much so. Young Johnny Weissmuller's Tarzan was lithe, strong and athletic with a beautiful manly body. In Tarzan and the Desert Mystery, Johnny Weissmuller looked big , strong and the way he lifted the Arabs --accompanying the American girl magician Nancy Kelly who was providing a free performance in the middle of a desert-- and threw them by mistake despite protests from Kelly was very impressive and entertaining. The second scene that was equally entertaining was the scene in which Tarzan was attacked after being falsely accused of stealing the stallion. Here we find Tarzan throwing the opponents about like little toys and fighting like a majestic lion. I think only Weissmuller could give such a splendid performance. He looked every inch a Tarzan and I should think he was much better built than perhaps Lincoln and Scott. Scott had weight lifter's build and became an extremely believable Tarzan in later films and Lincoln so long as he was in the jungle proved to be a very popular Tarzan with the moviegoers. Nancy Kelly's performance was very humorous and at times very very perceptive. Johnny Sheffield's performance as boy was as to expected , excellent. Cheeta was a great fun to watch and interestingly besides the usual quota of animal extras viz lions, elephants, wild horses, monkeys a number of mysterious prehistoric creatures were included and also a gigantic spider. The stallion that Tarzan rode added an extra element of interest and a novel feature and instead of stampeding wild elephants we have horses stampeding in this movie. The story is quite what one could expect if one is familiar with Newspaper Tarzan Comic Strips as drawn by Hogarth, Manning, Celardo and Foster. These news paper comic strips gave Tarzan a personality and ultimately made it popular enough to be made into movies. The story is a good change but what one could expect for a good Tarzan yarn. Another feature one notices in this film is instead of the " repetitious" vine swinging one finds in in some of excellent MGM films the vine swinging is a refreshing change in this RKO film. I enjoyed it very much and it is an excellent fare for the whole family. I have seen it several times.

When I was growing up and Tarzan pictures were shown regularly on a local television station every saturday morning, this is the one I and my friends would wait for: the one with the giant spider. It's not the best of the series otherwise, but has an interesting locale (North rather than sub-Saharan Africa), and a non-Jane leading lady for the big guy (Nancy Kelly). I can't recall whether Tarzan and Miss Kelly get together romantically, but she was a most attractive woman and a nice change of pace for the series, which was beginning to run out of gimmicks. Otto Kruger makes a pretty good, refined villain; his small, slight stature contrasts interestingly with Weisssmuller's. But it's the spider most people remember best from this film, and it's big, furry one with a sticky web and eight disturbingly agile legs. I've never cared much for arachnids, and don't know anyone who does, and so just watching the movie was both a trial and a thrill, as I could only hope I would behave with such bravery and resourcefulness as the swinging hero of the film were I caught up in a similar circumstance.