Farmer Al Falfa's Ape Girl (1932) User Reviews

A sexy cartoon, no doubt inspired by the Tarzan craze.

[planktonrules · 7/10 · 18 February 2021]

"Farmer Al Falfa's Ape Girl" is a cartoon from Paul Terry and Educational Pictures that is a bit surprising due to it's Pre-Code sensibilities....sensibilities that will no doubt surprise viewers today. That's because in the days before July, 1934, the studios basically ignored the old Production Code and films were surprisingly raunchy in some cases. Nudity, extreme violence, infidelity, cursing and even premarital sex were not that unusual in these films...a sharp contrast to the films that came out after the toughened Code was enacted.

While I wouldn't say that this cartoon is R-rated or even inappropriate for kids, there is no way it would have been allowed to be shown with the new Code....none. This is because it has nudity and strong indications that the cartoon characters have a very active sex life!!

The story is told with no words...though it came out during the talking picture era. The first half of the film simply consists of a lady Tarzan sort of character cavorting about with animals, such as monkeys, hippos and, oddly, dinosaurs! Then, Farmer Al Alfafa arrives....and the frisky lady kidnaps him and makes him her love slave....every man's secret dream!

The film came out when Tarzan novels and movies were very popular...and so a lady Tarzan seems like a natural. Very cute and funny, though the animation quality is quite poor compared to most other American studios. Well worth seeing....and strange!

Risque Terrytoons

[TheLittleSongbird · 7/10 · 1 March 2018]

The Terrytoons are oddly interesting, mainly for anybody wanting to see (generally) older cartoons made by lesser known and lower-budget studios. They are a mixed bag in quality, with some better than others, often with outstanding music and with some mild amusement and charm and variable in animation, characterisation and content.

Like with the Terrytoons from 1930 and 1931, the 1932 batch has been very mixed, the best being above average if not mindblowing and the worst being weak. 'Farmer Al Falfa's Ape Girl' is one of the better 1932 Terrytoons easily, being one of the pretty good ones if not one that blows the mind. As said a few times already in my previous reviews for the Terrytoons, the main reason for viewing is mainly for anybody striving to see every Terrytoons available like me but has more to it than that.

Best asset is the music, which predictably is incredible. It is so beautifully and cleverly orchestrated and arranged, is great fun to listen to and full of lively energy, doing so well with enhancing the action. The animation is an improvement to usual, still crude and stiff in the character designs, but generally transitions are smoother, there is no obvious repetition, recycling or cheating and the backgrounds are some of the most detailed and ambitious of the 1932 output.

There is a charm that is natural and never forced, one that is also sweet and fun. A vast majority of the gags are amusing (some of the funniest of the early Terrytoons, and there is more of them than can usually be found), sharply timed and surprisingly risqué and racy for Terrytoons, back at a time where cartoons were able to get to get away with more than those made after the Production Code was enforced. Pacing is lively.

Farmer Al Falfa feels like a lead character and is fun to watch. Likewise with the other characters.

However, some of the animation is still crude and stiff. The story is pretty thin and formulaic.

Lastly, although a vast majority of the gags work very well a few (mentioned in a previous comment) are questionable and ones that many will not find tasteful.

Overall, pretty good. 7/10 Bethany Cox

Al Falfa's Ape Girl was another interesting pre-Code Terrytoons short

[tavm · 6/10 · 29 September 2009]

This was another pre-Code cartoon I watched on Uncle John's Crazy Town site. Made by Paul Terry and Frank Moser for Terrytoons with an entertaining Philip Scheib score, the title character is a woman who lives like Tarzan with her swimming and cavorting among the animals. Since this was before 1934 when the Production Code went into full effect, they actually show some butts like the woman when underwater and a fish she spanks. (Don't ask!) There's also some unfortunate gags like a male chimpanzee striking his nagging wife or one chimp shooting into a head of another one while that other one keeps count on a paper on a trunk. Otherwise, this was quite enjoyable with the Farmer coming in at the end with a gag that I could see coming but was still grin inducing for me. So on that note, Farmer Al Falfa's Ape Girl is worth a look.

Surprising Adult Pre-Code Cartoon

[WillEd · 10/10 · 7 September 2015]

Let's face it. Terrytoons are generally crappy. This one is miles better than their usual.

The animation is better (though still far from a Disney or Fleisher from the same year), the gags are inventive, and it is a far cry from the usual Terrytoon of the period with the farm animals and the mice.

And the jungle girl gives Betty Boop a run for her money with the risqué gags. She is also sexier.

After catching this on YouTube, I thought I misjudged Paul Terry cartoons. Maybe they were better in the early thirties. But, no, the other ones I found were nothing.

Surprisingly good short for Terrytoons

[llltdesq · 8/10 · 9 October 2015]

This is a pre-Code cartoon in the Farmer Al Falfa series produced by Terrytoons. There will be spoilers ahead:

This is a pre-Code short and there are elements in here which most parents would consider a bit much for children. While this is nominally a Farmer Al Falfa cartoon, he's actually a minor character in here, showing up at the tail end of the cartoon.

More than two-thirds of this features the jungle, the animals in the jungle and, most importantly, the main character of the ape girl. She's initially a static drawing being catered to by some of her animal subjects, but the cartoon becomes hers fairly quickly.

She pretty much does everything Tarzan does-swing on vines, do the yell and interact with the animals and so on. But, being a cartoon, she can do things a live-action ape man can't do. She wears a brief top and a skimpy grass skirt. When she dives in the water and goes for a swim, it's enough to make a censor cover their eyes so they can peek through their fingers while maintaining a moral sense of outrage. There's a cute scene where the ape girl is changing and puts her things on a clothesline.

Enter Al the big game hunter, for the last minute and change. He shoots a few animals and the ape girl sics the animals on him. There's some nice animation here before the ape girl personally takes down Al. The ending is cute and bizarre, so I won't spoil it here.

This is actually a Terrytoon worthy of notice. Recommended.