Many of the MGM Tarzan films were exceptionally good and well made. Wanting to cash in on the studio's success, many lesser production companies also made similar films, though with a fraction of the budget or attention to details. Most of these Tarzan and Tarzan-like films from other studios stink when you see them today. Too often, the films are filled with poorly integrated stock footage and silly acting...and Monogram Studio's "The Lion Hunters" is really no exception. The story involves an expedition which has come to the jungle to trap lions. Unfortunately, the trapper they have hired, Marty, has zero regard for the animals or the locals. When Bomba the Jungle Boy finds a dying lion which Marty shot, he demands the folks leave and never return. Naturally, they don't just leave...otherwise the film would last only about 10 minutes! There are several awful things about the film. First, too often the flick relies on stock footage that obviously doesn't match the film stock. Some include non-African animals (such as alligators) ad the footage of the guy fighting the gator is OBVIOUSLY not the actor!! There also is the god-awful use of rear-projection--and it's so obvious that Johnny Sheffield (Bomba) is no where near any adult lions! And, speaking of Sheffield, I never understood having a guy who speaks much like any American high school student playing a guy raised in the jungle! He's also pretty stiff and lacks charisma....making the film a bit of a chore to watch. By the way, at one point in the film Bomba tells a girl that the baby lions need the male lions to provide food for them and hunt for the pride. Well, Bomba, it doesn't generally work that way. Female lions do the 'lion's share' of the hunting while males often lie about and do nothing to provide meat for the rest of them.

Hunters are trapping and killing lions in Bomba's jungle. Bomba has feelings on this. Fifth entry in Monogram's series is pretty weak with an especially talkative Bomba this time around. The pluses are the animals, particularly the lions, and Sheffield's earnest performance. Morris Ankrum and Douglas Kennedy play the lion hunters. Kennedy is the heavy, which was hardly new territory for him. Ankrum's the nicer one. Ann E. Todd plays his tomboyish daughter who takes a liking to Bomba and vice versa. This was Todd's final movie before an early retirement. Woody Strode appears briefly as a native. This is a fairly standard Bomba movie. Which is to say it's an unremarkable B jungle adventure for kids. Still, a decent time-passer on a lazy Saturday afternoon.

The Lion Hunters have come to Africa to do just as the title of the picture says they do. But what they don't know is that the lions are both held as sacred by the Masai tribe and that the area they've chosen is the home of the legendary Bomba the Jungle Boy. He just doesn't like white folks trapping or killing his animal friends as a matter of general principle. Between the two of these facts, white trappers Morris Ankrum and Douglas Kennedy haven't a chance. Especially Kennedy whose hubris gets the better of him. It's always interesting in these B films how the villains never know when to quit.Johnny Sheffield is allowed a little puppy love here in the person of Ann E. Todd who is also Ankrum's daughter. She's checking the well built Sheffield out, but he's got his mind on his animals.The Lion Hunters never gets off the Monogram back lot with plenty of stock jungle footage supporting a hackneyed plot.

After he grew too old to play 'Boy' in the Tarzan movies, Johnny Sheffield wound up in this Monogram cheapie series based on the Bomba books/cartoon strip. In this one he is joined by Ann Todd, who had also been a child actor, as the ingénue, playing the daughter of a lion trapper.For a Monogram movie there is a potentially interesting message about ecology: that it is simply not right to trap lions and keep them in cages. Of course, there is no real philosophy behind it in this movie. But there are hints of.... well, something. Bomba and the natives speak broken English at all times, but they have a sense of dignity and honor.All in all, a silly, cheap movie, but I enjoyed it for the animals. Not only at least two lions, but a hawk, a monkey and folks walking around in pith helmets. Not to mention the funky hats the natives wear.