The Mystery of the Leaping Fish (1916)

Sadly Over-hyped

I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

The biggest problem with this movie is it’s a little better than you think it might be, which somehow makes it worse. As in, it takes itself a bit too seriously, which makes most of the movie feel kind of dull.

I never knew a 90-year-old film like this - humorously advocating the use of cocaine and opium in a spoof of Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes - existed, and watching it is a little like stepping into some parallel universe; one where America's golden action man Douglas Fairbanks Jr. is an inanely grinning dope fiend, bouncing around on the balls of his feet with a big grin on his face, completely out of his head for the film's entire running time.He plays a detective who eats, sleeps, drinks and takes dope when he isn't solving crime. When we're introduced to him he's sitting at a desk with a huge tub of cocaine on it and repeatedly injecting into his arm. He's asked by the chief of police to investigate a suspicious character who is rolling in money and, in no time at all, nabs the bad guys and wins the winsome Bessie Love, who we first meet blowing up a fish. It's that kind of movie, and while it won't have you laughing out loud too often it will surely leave you questioning whether you're really seeing what you're seeing.

Usually when you delve into films this old and minor, its a slog through the ordinary. But every once in a while, you encounter something pretty radical.This is a story of an ersatz Sherlock Holmes played by Douglas Fairbanks (senior), and is framed by him as himself trying to sell the script.Within the story proper, we have two components. One is a spoof of Sherlock as a dope fiend, someone who literally cannot go more than 60 seconds without an injection. The second component is a reduced mystery involving drug smuggling and ending with the detective "Coke Ennyday" getting the girl. Both of these use the same comic devices involving the effects of cocaine, then legal.Its a bit tiresome after a while, but the thing continues to surprise with secondary comic effects that are quite clever. In fact, I enjoyed this more than the last twenty contemporary comedies I have seen. But then I am a particularly receptive audience because I take the detective form so seriously.The talent here is Tod Browning, from the era of "Intolerance." It shows. Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching.

I first came across this little gem while watching "Night Flight" on the USA Network in the very early 1980s. I was astounded and thought this must surely be a clever parody of silent movies, I mean the drug use was just so, BLATANT. I have never seen anything like it since and I am thankful that I was recording the show that night so I can convince myself that it was NOT just a dream and that there really was such a movie. A wonderful, silent comedy that will have you bug-eyed with amazement as well as laughing uproariously. Not Cheech & Chong crude, but weird in a spooky 1916 way, maybe the good old days werent as "innocent" as we are led to believe. if you get a chance (although I dont know who would DARE show this on TV anymore...) SEE IT! Behold, Bemuse and Bewilder!

Something happened when Hollywood got respectable; it got less fun. This is a silly bit of nonsense that had a brief revival as camp 25 or 30 years ago. It merely plays off the fact that, according to his creator, Sherlock Holmes was a cocaine addict. Later films that touched on this subject (most notably The Seven Percent Solution) generally had to treat it as Watson did--the disease of a great man. I certainly don't advocate drug abuse, but zany Holmes the cokehead is far more congenial than dutiful sober Holmes surrendering his mystery to the dull schematics of that officious intermeddler, Dr. Freud.