After losing the chance to direct it himself and seeing it fall into the hands of others, screenwriter Robert Towne took his name off the script to 1984's Greystoke: The Legend Of Tarzan, Lord Of The Apes and replaced it with that of his beloved dog. The dog was later nominated for an Academy Award. Don't expect any such honor to be bestowed upon Tarzan And The Lost City. While it wouldn't be fair to say that it could have been written by a dog, a team of intelligent apes—particularly ones that have spent a lot of time watching the USA Network—could probably have pieced it together. Starship Troopers' Casper Van Dien and nymphet Jane March star as Tarzan and Jane, respectively. Steven Waddington, the poor man's Cary Elwes, plays a scientist looking for a legendary lost city, although the reason isn't quite clear. Though he presumably believes the discovery will make him rich and famous, Waddington spends most of his time blowing the lost city up, piece by piece. Van Dien takes it upon himself to stop this from proceeding. That's the whole movie. Tarzan And The Lost City is notable primarily because a run-of-the-mill, uninspired Tarzan movie is being released in 1998. With nothing done to set up the major characters, it feels like an installment in a series that doesn't actually exist. It does, however, feature repeated scenes of Van Dien performing the Tarzan yell and swinging on vines—in case you would otherwise forget that this is a Tarzan film—and some discount-aisle computer effects. It also has the good sense to be relatively short, but the day that becomes reason enough to see a film is the day they should stop being made.