When Sheena (Tanya Roberts) was a little girl, she was taken to Africa by her scientist parents who were investigating rumours of a particular panacea there - could such a thing be true, or was it a myth? They found a lead when a man dying of cancer was spirited away to a special area of earth in the African plains where the Zamboola tribe lived, and sure enough there he was, buried up to his neck in the ground. On being lifted out of the hole he had been cured, and the girl's parents were delighted to have succeeded in their goal, but that wasn't to last as soon after, while staying with the tribe, they were caught in a cave-in, leaving her an orphan...
And she grew up to be Tarzan, Lord of the Jungle! Um, not quite, she was actually Sheena, Queen of the Jungle (though oddly her parents call her Janet during their limited screen time), the movie incarnation of a female Tarzan character who had been around in comic books since the nineteen-thirties, but was most memorable at the time leading up to this production for a fifties television show where she was played by the statuesque Irish McCalla. That lady, though having established her career as a glamour model, kept her clothes on for the series, but this was the eighties and evidently it was believed Sheena needed a degree of spicing up, as some generations now have discovered.
After her two younger counterparts playing little girl Sheena are seen learning their jungle person craft (though she spends more time on the plains), which includes communicating with animals by adopting a Bruce Forsyth-esque pose, well, it works on a hedgehog, Tanya was introduced leaving us in no doubt as to why she was cast and why we should continue to watch. That's right, she's having a shower underneath a waterfall, so stark raving naked, very tasteful we're sure, but speaking to a rather more cynical (perhaps the filmmakers would have said "honest") reason to stick with the movie. Basically: keep watching and Tanya will get 'em orf again. For a character designed to appeal to kids, you might have thought that was a bit rum.
Which is in the possession of our hero Vic Casey, played by Ted Wass in a role he took after hitting stardom in sitcom spoof Soap, though when you know he graduated to being a successful TV comedy director that should give you some idea of the reception to Sheena. Anyway, Vic Casey is the love interest to Sheena because he can help her out, saving the tribe and so on as she insists on using his full name at every opportunity, as if using a cross between Johnny Weissmuller and Bo Derek's respective Tarzan movies as a template for our jungle girl. Sad to say, she may have looked the part but Tanya's acting was nothing short of embarrassing, blankly emoting when she wasn't riding a horse painted with zebra stripes (was anyone fooled?), so that left the stunts which to be fair were not half bad, flamingo attack aside, if rather absurd in a beefed up with explosions version of the traditional Tarzan stampede. Director John Guillermin had helmed possibly the finest movie ever to feature the Ape Man, but Sheena remained steadfastly clunky in contrast. Music by Richard Hartley (and Vangelis?!).
Twenty years ago Sheena was screened quite regularly on TV. That version was evidently sanitised because I don't remember any nudity (damn it!). Sadly it seems no-one who ever worked with Tanya Roberts can say anything nice about her. She was notoriously difficult.
Posted by:
Graeme Clark
Date:
6 Nov 2013
Be careful what you say about Tanya, or she might send a herd of elephants rampaging through your sitting room. I was only familiar with the edited for TV version of Sheena too, but unless you're a really big fan of the leading lady it's not really worth tracking down the uncut one.
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