Nabonga (1944)
** (out of 4)
A thief steals some priceless jewels and heads off in an airplane with his young daughter. The plane ends up crashing and the little girl befriends an injured gorilla in the jungle. Flash forward several years and explorer Ray Gorman (Buster Crabbe) hears about a "white witch" from the jungle that "fell from a big bird" and heads there to search for the jewels. He finds the now woman (Julie London) being protected by a large gorilla but must find a way to get her to lead him to the jewels.
NABONGA, meaning gorilla, is a rather silly and low-budget jungle adventure that manages to be slightly entertaining as long as you don't take it too serious. if you're looking to find a meaning for life or some sort of great art then it's best you avoid this film at all costs and I'd also recommend not even looking at the posters for it. However, if you like cheap entertainment and just want 71 minutes to kill then there's certainly much worse out there.
I think the best thing about the film are the leads. While neither Crabbe or London give excellent performances, they at least have a nice chemistry together and I thought they were good enough to carry the picture. There's a scene where Crabbe is trying to act afraid of her pet gorilla that is quite funny and especially some of the flirtation going on between them.
The biggest problem with the movie is the fact that the budget was probably a tad bit higher than a pack of gum. There's a ton of stock footage in the movie that makes it look even cheaper and there's no doubt that the majority of the "real" footage was probably shot on one set with very limited range. More times than not the characters just stay in one spot and talk.
NABONGA was meant to be cheap entertainment, which is what it pretty much is.