Simply A Masterpiece

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

This is a must-see and one of the best documentaries - and films - of this year.

One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

Elephant Stampede (1951) ** (out of 4) While Bomba (Johnny Sheffield) is in the jungle having a pretty teacher's aid (Donna Martell) teach him to reach, a couple poachers are killing elephants for their ivory. Soon the two men find out about Bomba and must kill him so that they can get back to their business. The sixth film in the series actually turns out to be one of the most entertaining but than again this is a cheap Bomba movie from Monogram so one shouldn't be expecting an actual good movie. I think there are some pretty funny and campy moments throughout and not the ones we're used to seeing like the stock footage o rear projection stuff. There's an entire side-story dealing with this young, beautiful school assistant wanting to have fun with Bomba but he keeps pushing her away instead preferring to learn his ABCs. This leads to her wanting to make him jealous and take off with the two poachers who are constantly sexually harassing her. I'm not sure how many children in the audience knew this or cared about it but I'm sure the majority of the adults watching, then and now, couldn't help but laugh at Bomba for rejecting such a beauty. The film is actually quite dark for children because there's quite a bit of violence against elephants and especially Bomba. Poor jungle boy takes quite a beating here including being pistol whipped and knocked out a couple times. This action does help keep the film moving and I'd say that at times Bomba comes off as such a jerk you really don't mind it. Sheffield is certainly very comfortable in the part by now and he turns in a fine performance. Martell clearly steals the film as the teacher's aid. The support is pretty good as well, which is rare for this series. All in all, fans of the series should be some entertainment out of this but just don't expect something great.

***SPOILERS*** The usual non violent and peace loving Bomba, Johnny Sheffield, the jungle boy takes the gloves off and keeps his loin cloth and underneath briefs on in taking on a number of poachers who are out to shoot his elephant friends for their precious ivory tusks.Gunning down their guide Game Warden Mark Phllips, Guy Kingsford, Warren & Collins, John Kellogg & Myron Healey,are now free to gun down as many elephants as they want and take their Ivory tusks across the border of the game reserve into Portuguese territory. With Warren impersonating the late Mark Phillips the two poachers have a field day in gunning down helpless elephants until Bomba arrives and puts their plans on ice. By him organizing his elephant friends with the help of his monkey sidekick to strike back at the poachers with the fury of an unstoppable elephant stampede.It's not just the elephants that we and Bomba get to see in the film there's also pretty Lola,Donna Martell, who's helping the local natives with her boss spinster schoolmaster Miss. Banks, Edith Evarson, on their A.B.C's. So that they get get educated enough to be able to read the works of Milton Melville and Dickens that she has ready or them in her school library.It's when both Warren & Collins plan to raid the secret cave that tons of ivory tusks are hidden in that the very naive chief Nagaila, Martin Wilkins, told them about that Bomba springs into action. There's also the fact that the two poachers later kidnap and are holding both Lola and Miss. Banks hostage and threaten to murder them if they don't get what they want- the information that Bomba has-in finding the secret cave. That also gets Bomba a bit, quite a bit, hot under, since he doesn't wear a shirt, the loin cloth in him dealing with them.***SPOILERS*** Violent ending with the elephants coming to Bomba Lola and Miss.Banks rescue and putting and end to both Warran and Collins,who had by then had a falling out, dreams of wealth and glory. It was the worst of the two Warren, who shot and killed his partner Collins and wounded Lola, who ended up getting the worst of it. In him being trampled to death by the rampaging elephants whom he was planning to do in for their ivory. As for Bomba he's now back swinging on tree vines with his monkey friends in the jungle and eating his favorite diet of coconuts and bananas. And thanks to Lola in her teaching Bomba to read and write English he plans to find a newsstand,if there's one in the jungle, and get the latest edition of the Wall Street Journal New York Times and Washington Post and catch up with the latest business and news of the world. That's if he can somehow come up with the cash to buy them.

This segment of the Bomba the Jungle Boy series finds Bomba trying to better himself by learning to read. Teaching him is the lovely Donna Martell, teaching assistant to Edith Evanson at the local native village. She'd like to further Bomba's education in other ways, but Bomba has his mind on book learning.All that comes to an end when ivory poachers arrive in the territory in the persons of John Kellogg and Myron Healey. They murder their professional hunting guide and assume his identity. And Healey starts moving in on Martell which bothers everyone.Elephant Stampede marked the appearance of Leonard Mudie as Commissioner Andy Barnes. The character appeared in the first Bomba film with another actor, but was then dropped. Mudie played Barnes throughout the rest of the series and was the only other regular besides Johnny Sheffield as Bomba.If you know the Tarzan series and know his relationship with the elephant community and how they mutually aid each other you know something about how this turns out. And Bomba does need the aid of his pachyderm friends.One of the better in the Bomba series.

Bomba, the Jungle Boy returns, predictably involved in peril as he tangles with two mercenary Americans--ivory poachers in the jungle who have just killed their guide and plot to overtake an ivory shipment running through Portugese territory. Despite the camp-exotic undermining (which all the "Bomba" movie inevitably possess), this episode in the serial is curiously top-heavy with violent action (some of it rather nasty). Bomba is punched, pistol-whipped, shot at, and shot down; at one point, he misses a bullet by inches, which instead strikes a pretty native girl harboring a crush on the "jungle devil". Stock footage makes up most of the title stampede (a great deal of which is ridiculously sped-up, one presumes for time), while both the acting and Ford Beebe's direction are equally wooden. Johnny Sheffield is still charming as Bomba; resembling a corn-fed kid straight off the farm, or perhaps a quarterback on the high school football team, Sheffield cannot belie his embarrassment over this cheapjack endeavor, but neither does he get ambitious or attempt to turn his Bomba into a super-hero. The lackadaisical personality of Bomba (who speaks to his elephants in Swahili and asks questions like, "Why are there two f's in 'giraffe'?") is a major part of his appeal. Without him, this would be just another matinée quickie--one with a hardened heart. ** from ****