Douglas Fairbanks usually had a firm sense of his audience and what they wanted to see him do on screen. Here, he oddly varies the formula. Doug portrays a monocled popinjay, American-born but raised in Europe since age four. Doug usually had the upper hand in every situation: here, he's kidnapped, bound, gagged, and suffers multiple indignities. Of course, when the chips are down he proves himself. But, for once, Doug plays a character who must *earn* the audience's respect, rather than commanding it from the first frame.
You'll enjoy this rousing action comedy if you ignore some bizarre lapses in logic and common sense. It seems that some Amerindians have a secret diamond mine on an Arizona reservation. #1: the only region of the United States that has ever yielded diamonds is Arkansas; #2: if this land contained anything valuable, the U.S. government would never have let the Amerindians keep it. #3: somehow, villain Wallace Beery brings raw diamonds from Arizona to Amsterdam, and they miraculously become cut gemstones en route. #4: this provokes the attention of the Secret Service, an organisation which (in 1920) only dealt with counterfeiters and Presidential security. #5: after being abducted in Monte Carlo and whisked to an isolated trading-post in Arizona, Fairbanks whips out some banknotes which are immediately accepted as legal tender. What currency have you got there, Doug?
SLIGHT SPOILER. There's a wee bit of mystery as to which of Fairbanks's Yank friends is the Secret Service agent, but we swiftly learn that she's sweet Mollie Warren. Which leads us to #6: secret agent Mollie Warren is accompanied on this dangerous mission by an older woman who appears to be her genuine mother, not an undercover agent posing as her mother. (What's Mrs Warren's profession?) Even after Mollie's cover is blown, her mother appears to be a genuine civilian caught in the cross-fire.
Well, who goes to the movies for coherent story-lines? 'The Mollycoddle' has some exciting action sequences and some splendid Arizona scenery that could almost be a dress rehearsal for those magnificent Monument Valley scenes in John Ford's westerns. And there are some solid laughs here, too: I enjoyed Doug's unflappable behaviour in a tuna cannery, as well as the scene afterward, in which -- reeking of albacore -- he's followed by several hungry cats. As entertainment, I'll rate 'The Mollycoddle' 6 out of 10. For a plausible scenario, though, look elsewhere.
You'll enjoy this rousing action comedy if you ignore some bizarre lapses in logic and common sense. It seems that some Amerindians have a secret diamond mine on an Arizona reservation. #1: the only region of the United States that has ever yielded diamonds is Arkansas; #2: if this land contained anything valuable, the U.S. government would never have let the Amerindians keep it. #3: somehow, villain Wallace Beery brings raw diamonds from Arizona to Amsterdam, and they miraculously become cut gemstones en route. #4: this provokes the attention of the Secret Service, an organisation which (in 1920) only dealt with counterfeiters and Presidential security. #5: after being abducted in Monte Carlo and whisked to an isolated trading-post in Arizona, Fairbanks whips out some banknotes which are immediately accepted as legal tender. What currency have you got there, Doug?
SLIGHT SPOILER. There's a wee bit of mystery as to which of Fairbanks's Yank friends is the Secret Service agent, but we swiftly learn that she's sweet Mollie Warren. Which leads us to #6: secret agent Mollie Warren is accompanied on this dangerous mission by an older woman who appears to be her genuine mother, not an undercover agent posing as her mother. (What's Mrs Warren's profession?) Even after Mollie's cover is blown, her mother appears to be a genuine civilian caught in the cross-fire.
Well, who goes to the movies for coherent story-lines? 'The Mollycoddle' has some exciting action sequences and some splendid Arizona scenery that could almost be a dress rehearsal for those magnificent Monument Valley scenes in John Ford's westerns. And there are some solid laughs here, too: I enjoyed Doug's unflappable behaviour in a tuna cannery, as well as the scene afterward, in which -- reeking of albacore -- he's followed by several hungry cats. As entertainment, I'll rate 'The Mollycoddle' 6 out of 10. For a plausible scenario, though, look elsewhere.