Manhattan Madness (1916)
(Lloyd Ingraham, US 1916, 52 min., 35mm)
Before he was a founding member of United Artists, and before he was the swashbuckler remembered for The Black Pirate (1926) and The Thief of Bagdad (1924), Douglas Fairbanks was an agile, adept leading man, capable of both humor and romance, as seen in these two films. In the first, Fairbanks plays Steve O’Dare, a New York socialite returning after getting his fill of adventure in the West. His friends want him to stay, promising that the city will give him all the excitement he wants. In the second, Fairbanks is Cassius Lee, an entomologist who stumbles upon, and tangles with, a malted milk manufacturer illegally transporting gunpowder to Mexico. Fairbanks’s particular verve matches perfectly with the absurdist plots, providing fun, fast-paced romps.
Live piano accompaniment by Dr. Philip C. Carli