MOVIE OF THE DAY: "AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 MINUTES WITH DOUGLAS FAIRBANKS" (1931)

Like many middle-aged men, Douglas Fairbanks went through a midlife crisis, thanks to
a floundering marriage (to Mary Pickford), the end of silents (his thin, cigarette-worn voice was unsuitable for sound), and, perhaps worst of all, watching his son, Doug Jr., usurp him at the box office.

In short, the King of Hollywood had been dethroned.

And, like many men in his condition, he reacted by rounding up a few friends and going on a little trip to get away from it all. But unlike your average guy spending a weekend in Vegas, Fairbanks invited director Victor Fleming, cameraman Henry Sharp, and production manager Charles Lewis on a six-month cruise to Asia. The idea was to shoot a movie to be released by United Artists, the studio Fairbanks built with Pickford, Charlie Chaplin and D.W. Griffith. It's good to be the King, even if you have been dethroned.

Doug and his pals look forward to a half year
away from their wives.

What they eventually came up was a schizophrenic travelogue that can't decide if it wants to be serious, silly, or even authentic. It's even unclear what the real title is. All the original posters call it Around the World in 80 Minutes with Douglas Fairbanks, while the opening credits leave out "in 80 Minutes". Most contemporary sources drop "with Douglas Fairbanks". For brevity's sake, let's call it ATW.

Where's the KFC?

The best thing about ATW is that it captures "exotic" lands just before they became totally modernized. While Doug assures us that Hawaii has amenities like hotels and drugstores, the first glimpse is that of a lush American territory, decades away from statehood, filled with, as he describes them, "wonderfully simple people." They'd love hearing that today, I'm sure.

The former King meets the current Duke

While in Hawaii, Doug hangs with Olympic swimming champ Duke Kahanamoku, who appears mildly bemused at the sight of this almost-washed-up movie star with the endless leis around his neck. But just to prove he's still got what it takes, Doug goes surfing with him, which was probably the first time most American movie audiences even heard of the sport. By the way, Doug falls off his surfboard.

Celebrity Cruises encourages its passengers
to exercise like this.

Speaking of surfing, Doug never shies away from showing off his athleticism or physique, whether performing dangerous stunts aboard ship or clambering up a temple in Angkor. While amusing, it seems like a guy nearing 50 trying to remind people he still has what it takes to play Zorro or Robin Hood -- even if he sounds more like a would-be stand-up comic with poor timing. 

Trust me, there's nothing funnier than
poor families begging for pennies from
rich tourists.

Still, I must admit that half the fun of watching old travelogues like ATW is the patronizing narration reserved for "foreign lands", and Doug never disappoints. While he has good words for the people of the countries he visits -- calling the Chinese "the most vitally interesting people in the world", or looking upon in wonder at India's spirituality -- Doug can't resist making cracks about beggars, slums, and children who can't afford decent clothes. White man very hilarious!

Doug might have his hands behind him,
but Uncle Sam's are controlling Aguinaldo.

Not all the condescension is aimed at poor folks. While in the US-controlled Philippines, Doug meets General Emilio Aguinaldo, who he reminds us was our enemy during the Spanish-American War, but is now "one of our most useful citizens" -- i.e., our puppet in what he refers to as a land of "strange, primitive savages". Remind me again, why do so many people loathe us?

Fairbanks is literally all over the map.

Doug also takes the time share bad puns and silly jokes, like the one about a guy with three children who didn't want a fourth. It seems the fellow heard that "every fourth child born in the world is a Chinaman." Hi-yo!

Other jokes are strictly topical. As we see the ancient temples of Siam (now Thailand), he remarks, "These ruins are in a perfect state of preservation -- like the Republican Party." Throw in references to long-gone celebrities like Graham McNamee and Ukulele Ike, and ATW becomes a game of Trivial Pursuit only I could win.

A racist rodent.

And from out of nowhere, Doug invites "the world's biggest movie star", Mickey Mouse, to get into the ugly American act, dancing to a Siamese melody while occasionally squinting his eyes to look Asian. Audiences today would recoil in horror. And yet -- he's so darned cute! I mean, after his all-too brief appearance is over, I dare you not to hit "rewind". (Don't let the Disney people know about it, because they'd probably try to destroy every copy of ATW.)

The handsomest ugly Americans ever.

When not alternately complimenting and ridiculing the people they meet, Fairbanks and Victor Fleming spend most of their time golfing. In fact, they're rather upset that the golf course in Peking is currently being used by the army as a battlefield during their civil war. Darn those wars!

In a scene sure not to amuse women today, Doug and Vic are caught peeking through a doorway where, inside, a young Japanese woman is getting dressed in what she assumed was the privacy of her own home. That this bit is clearly a studio-shot piece of fiction makes no difference. Like a later scene in India where Doug is shown fighting hand-to-paw with a tiger, this phoney-baloney is brushed off by Doug with, "History is a compound of fact and fancy. So why not film?" Good save, Doug, good save.

Why do you suppose this shot of Doug and
Vic didn't make the final cut?

In fact, several minutes of the India scene were obviously shot on a soundstage. After watching a kid climb a rope before disappearing (a special effect old-hat even in 1931), Doug and the boys decide it's time to go home. But because they have to make it back in four minutes (remember the title), they jump on a magic carpet -- a reference to his 1924 classic The Thief of Baghdad -- and make their way across Europe, the Atlantic Ocean, New York, and Chicago (where they dodge gangsters'  bullets), before landing in Hollywood. (In a rare moment of genuinely sardonic wit, Doug describes the studio's gas tank as "the publicity department".) 

After landing, Doug thanks the audience, and promises a sequel that was never to be. As with Doug's next movie, Mr. Robinson Crusoe, you can't help but feel a little sad about how his career sputtered to an end. Even Victor Fleming appears to rub it in, turning off the lights as Doug is saying his goodbyes. There must be a nicer way to tell a pal it's time to get off the stage.

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MOVIE OF THE DAY: "THE MYSTERY OF THE LEAPING FISH" (1916)

All a man needs is his pipe and hypodermic needle.

The 3-reel comedy The Mystery of the Leaping Fish is the kind of movie that the word "bizarre" was created for.  Critically-reviled in its day and all but disowned by its star, Douglas Fairbanks, the short was rediscovered by a more welcoming audience during the early days of home video. Not so much for its quality, mind you, but its quantity. Like, in kilos. For this is the birth of drug humor in motion pictures.

Every person in Hollywood today is wondering,
How do I get my hands on that can?

You think Cheech & Chong took a lighthearted approach to drugs? 
They're like the Moscow Art Theater compared to Douglas Fairbanks, who, as detective Coke Ennyday, shoots up regularly as Jay Carney obfuscates. No other movie makes mainlining such a source of zany comedy. Ennyday's regular reaction to shooting up cocaine is to giggle like a madman, swing his arms wildly and dance a jittery two-step. Put him at the elbow of Liza Minnelli and he would've fit right in at Studio 54. 

Ennyday, sporting a phony mustache which he turns upside down or removes depending on his mood, is hired by the Secret Service to investigate an unnamed "gentleman" living the good life without any visible means of support. If that's a crime, somebody call the cops on Anthony Weiner.

And it's even better on toast with jam!

Ennyday discovers his prey has been smuggling opium inside the Leaping Fish floatation devices rented at the beach. Always up for a new thrill, Ennyday decides to taste the opium, which appears to have the consistency of vintage Nutella. And instead of knocking him out as opium is wont to do, it sends him into a frenzy that lasts for the rest of the movie. Was nobody concerned with realism while making this movie?!

Ennyday's sweetheart, whose job is inflating the Leaping Fish, is kidnapped by the smuggler and his Asian henchman. Tracing them to a Chinatown laundry, the detective subdues the smuggler with a hit of cocaine, which sends him literally flying to the ceiling. The cops arrive. Ennyday saves his sweetheart. Fade out.

But wait! In the positively meta epilogue, we see Douglas Fairbanks (as himself) in the office of a movie producer, to whom he has just read the script for The Mystery of the Leaping Fish. The producer advises him to stick to acting. This was the last time anybody said no to a movie star. 

Subtlety matched only by Kim Kardashian.

You'll notice that nowhere in the preceding paragraphs did you find the word "funny." For The Mystery of the Leaping Fish doesn't evoke laughter as much as it does open-mouthed disbelief. It's not just the drug gags that make you shake your head. Ennyday's front door is set up with a closed-circuit camera connected to his television -- in 1916. He travels in an ostentatious check-print auto (to match his clothes) with his butler perched on the backseat blowing a horn. Cops literally drive around in circles at the climax. The whole movie seems to be an elaborate private joke concocted by Fairbanks and his pals over a few drinks. When you consider that the scriptwriter was Tod Browning -- who went on to direct Freaks -- it all starts to make sense. 

Fairbanks' career was ascending at the time, so just why he thought playing a cocaine addict in a drug comedy was a good move is a mystery greater than that of the Leaping Fish. Perhaps this was one of those "personal" projects he had to "get out of his system" before going back to, you know, good movies.

If I have my way, this will soon be a common sight
at Coney Island.

By the way, the Leaping Fish were a real craze in Los Angeles at the time, and ripe for reintroduction for swimmers today. (Memo to self: check on patent expiration date.) Ennyday makes them float faster, of course, by injecting them with cocaine, but I seriously doubt that would work in real life.

As with many movies shot on location at the time, The Mystery of the Leaping Fish provides a fascinating look at how provincial a city Los Angeles was decades before freeways and the post-war population boom transformed it into a sprawling mass of houses and traffic. The brief exterior shot of L.A.'s Chinatown shows an area as dusty and unpaved as in the days of Jesse James. What was once simply just another comedy is today an artifact of a time and place that no longer exist.

Some modern day viewers consider The Mystery of the Leaping Fish one of the most hilarious pictures they've ever seen. I've watched it a few times over the years and have laughed at two things: 

1. Ennyday's telescope doubles as a hat. 
2. Ennyday's sweetheart is identified only as The Little Fish Blower. 

It's coke time.

Neither of these are necessarily worthy of Oscar Wilde or even Olivia Wilde, but with a movie like this, you have to get your fun where you find it. Not that The Mystery of the Leaping Fish isn't worth a half hour of your time. But maybe it works best if you have a clock similar to the kind Coke Ennyday uses, only one that reminds you when it's time to laugh.

Meta postscript: Alma Rubens, who plays the smuggler's girlfriend, died in 1931 as a result of heroin addiction.  


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MOVIE OF THE DAY: "MR. ROBINSON CRUSOE" (1932)

Mr. Robinson Crusoe presents an artist at the end of his rope, both artistically and personally. Having been one of the biggest movie actors in the world just three years earlier, Douglas Fairbanks had seen his star fall dramatically with the introduction of sound. 

Convinced, rightly, that the new technology, along with his advancing age, would no longer suit the brand of derring-do his fans had become accustomed to, he tried his hand at Shakespeare (The Taming of the Shrew with wife Mary Pickford), sophisticated comedy (Reaching for the Moon) and travelogue (Around the World in 80 Minutes), all to less than stellar results.

So it's no surprise that his fourth talkie was little more than a low-budget 70-minute home movie/vanity project, Mr. Robinson Crusoe. Writing the treatment under his usual nom-de-scenario, Elton Thomas, Fairbanks updated the classic story to that of millionaire Steve Drexel sailing to the Dutch Indies with his friend William Belmont. Drexel, tired of civilization, decides to jump ship and live like Crusoe on a deserted island. If he's still in one piece by the time William returns from his tiger hunting trip, he wins $1000. If not, well, Belmont loses a friend but saves a grand. Good trade-off.

I wouldn't get too comfortable,
Mr. White Boss Man.

Any Robinson Crusoe needs a Man Friday, and this version is no different. Unfortunately for Drexel, this Friday is a proto-Civil Rights activist who wants no part of playing Rochester to the white man, especially when said white man almost drowns him in an effort to correct his attitude. For reasons unexplained, Friday wears a necklace made of radio tubes, cuing Drexel to ask, "You killed a radio operator, hunh? You should've killed a radio announcer." Someone should have killed the writer.

Fairbanks wonders what to do with the
dame in the grass skirt, and comes up empty.

Soon after Friday takes his leave, a native woman escaping her wedding ceremony shows up. "Friday's gone," Drexel observes, "you must be Saturday." (The level of wit in Mr. Robinson Crusoe is staggering.) Drexel brings his conquest up to his home-built bachelor pad, which contains all the usual comforts, including a radio made of Friday's necklace, copper, a shell for the speaker and some wood for the base. (Bose, take note.)

He and Saturday immediately set up house, although he refuses to sleep in the same bed with her. Considering that Saturday is quite willing and good-looking, the reason for Drexel's non-reaction can only be speculated. Saturday, by the way, is played by Spanish actress Maria Alba, who looks about as "native" as Jean Harlow.

"Yeah, you're supposed to be dinner --
funny, hunh?"

Just to give you an idea of the kind of friends Drexel has, Belmont and Carmichael stop off at a nearby island and convince the natives to invade Drexel's pad. They're to pretend to be cannibals and, after capturing Drexel, start to roast him over a fire, whereupon Belmont and Carmichael will "save" him. All this to welsh on a lousy $1000 bet while spending a good six figures on an ocean voyage. I don't understand rich people.

Hey guys, there's a half-naked woman there,
and all you have are eyes for are each other.

The monkey saves the day -- as they always do in these things -- by turning on the radio, which scares the natives -- as they always do in these things. Drexel escapes and captures the natives in his trap. Belmont and Carmichael show up and are impressed by Drexel's surroundings. (Noticing the radio, Belmont exclaims with admiration, "The man is Mussolini!" Whatever you say, dude.) Escaping a further influx of natives, Drexel, his friends and Saturday sail off to safety on their yacht. By the climax, Drexel has sold off Saturday to the Ziegfeld Follies as a hula dancer. I was hoping she'd break free and climb the Empire State Building, but that idea was a year away.

It probably didn't take Fairbanks long to write the treatment. Much of the first half of Mr. Robinson consists of him: 1) Creating Rube Goldberg-type devices to make his life more

comfortable, and 2) Laughing. Laughing, in fact, is his first reaction to everything. Using animals as slave labor? Laughter. Listening to radio reports of traffic deaths and suicides back home? Laughter -- no kidding. He gets a real howl out of trapping a goat, who appears to have been drugged for its movie debut. This was well before the Hollywood branch of the ASPCA ruined all the fun animal abuse entails. 

More hilarity ensues when Belmont and Carmichael observe island natives. Carmichael explains that the village is preparing for an engagement ceremony, which will climax with the groom-to-be knocking out the front teeth of his beloved. Belmont chuckles, "Oh well, we do the same thing. Only we wait until after the ceremony." You just don't hear that kind of classy repartee anymore. Special note must be made of all the natives' clothing, which appears to have provided by a nearby Target.

In 2011, Fairbanks' outfit was sold
at auction for $1,700, which was
probably more than the movie's
budget.

After big-budget productions like Robin Hood, Zorro and The Black Pirate, a sorry little effort like Mr. Robinson Crusoe must have disappointed Fairbanks' remaining fans. He tries hard to combine the athletics of those classic adventure pictures and his earlier, modern-dress comedies (for Fairbanks made his mark as a physical comedian). But factors like age -- he was 49 but seems older -- and cigarettes worked against him.

Too, the movie wears its low budget on its ragged sleeve. Much of the first scene on the yacht was clearly shot in a studio with a very unconvincing back projection. The dialogue spoken on the location shooting is echoey and distracting thanks to poor post-production dubbing. The whole thing must have looked old-fashioned even in 1932.  






Crusoe's onscreen prologue is itself straight out of the silents. The "glories and freedom of a primitive paradise" promised could just as well refer to Fairbanks' Hollywood heyday as it does a deserted island. (Just to drive it home, co-star William Farnum was a former silent star as well, best known for The Spoilers, made in 1914.) One nice touch: circulating prints of Mr. Robinson Crusoe still contain the original exit music following the closing credits, the perfect accompaniment as you make your favorite tropical drink to forget what you just watched.

There's a sad, desperate air to Mr. Robinson Crusoe, with Douglas Fairbanks still trying to pretend it was 1925, when he was King of Hollywood and his namesake son wasn't yet more popular than he. His athletic grace comes to the fore from time to time -- but is that him making his climatic escape on a combination zipline/catapult? I think not. It kind of makes sense that his island-wear is a duplicate of Peter Pan's. Douglas Fairbanks had become a middle-aged boy who, sadly, refused to grow up.

     

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