GurlyIamBeach Instant Favorite.

Pacionsbo Absolutely Fantastic

Nessieldwi Very interesting film. Was caught on the premise when seeing the trailer but unsure as to what the outcome would be for the showing. As it turns out, it was a very good film.

Geraldine The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

Leofwine_draca THE THIEF OF BAGDAD is the lengthy silent version of the famous exotic adventure, with Douglas Fairbanks taking the title role. Seen today it's a rather slow and creaky affair, although not without interest; there's plenty to savour here, from the sets and the staging to the exotic characters and endless action. Truth be told, I enjoy the remake as it's less dated, but this film still packs a punch which is impressive given that I'm writing this review almost a hundred years after it was first released.

Edgar Soberon Torchia Easily and by far this is the best version that I have seen of "The Thief of Bagdad". It does not have the Technicolor opulent look of the 1940 version, and Douglas Fairbanks is not as handsome as the 1961 thief, played by Steve Reeves, but this 1924 production intelligently blends comedy and drama; the framing, angles and camera movements used by director Raoul Walsh and cinematographer Arthur Edeson are visually elegant; and sets, costumes and effects were beautifully conceived and executed. The film moves with a fascinating rhythm during the first two acts in Bagdad, before the Princess' suitors travel in search of the strangest treasures: there are countless sets to stage all the dramatic and action scenes: the marketplace, the sewers, the palace garden, the throne room, the Princess' bedroom, immense stairs, doors, walls, halls and vines, lavishly designed by William Cameron Menzies. Where it not for the overlong adaptation (I saw the 149 minutes restoration, with the Carl Davis score based on Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov's "Scheherazade"), this would have been an undeniable masterpiece. The narration drags a bit after the suitors leave Bagdad, the Mongol Prince's machinations, and the extended return of the thief (who inexplicably does not ride on the winged horse to the city), although there are also wonderful scenes in this third act, as the trip to find and test the magic apple and the creation of the new Bagdad army. Everybody is fine in this film: Fairbank as the thief is all smiles, but when he has to show the dramatic nuances of his character he excels; Sôjin Kamiyama is excellent as the Mongol Prince (especially when compared to the 1940 and 1961 villains, more than aptly played by Conrad Veidt and Arturo Dominici), and Julanne Johnston's Princess is both attractive and funny, but I especially enjoyed beautiful Anna May Wong as the wicked Oriental maid and hilarious Snitz Edwards as the thief's sidekick. A true cinematic gem.

Michael Neumann The acrobatic skill and charisma of Douglas Fairbanks fits well with the magnificent sets and magical special effects of this timeless romantic fantasy, but all the histrionic mugging and florid over-emoting only makes the silent epic look sadly dated when seen today. Thankfully the title role of the penniless thief who becomes a prince doesn't demand much acting prowess, allowing Fairbanks plenty of opportunities to express himself physically: jumping over walls, battling fierce supernatural creatures, riding his valiant steed over desert sands, and so forth. To win the hand of a beautiful princess he must embark on a quest to find the most wondrous object on Earth, and after triumphing over every adversity the two lovers are last seen floating away into the Arabian night on their flying carpet. The moral of story is spelled out in the twinkling stars overhead: Happiness Must Be Earned, and who can argue with that?

Steffi_P Cinema creates its own legends. Among the greatest of them was Douglas Fairbanks, in his incarnation as the eternal swashbuckler, a romantic hero who could only exist in the golden days of the silent era. Thief of Bagdad is his finest moment, the greatest tale he ever told.Although Fairbanks wore many different hats in his swashbucklers – exchanging the mask of Zorro for the cap of Robin Hood and so forth – each of these characters was just the same persona in a different time and place. His previous two efforts, The Three Musketeers and Robin Hood, spend a lot of time laying down back-story before allowing the hero to emerge, and this made them very profound but a little slow at times. In contrast, Thief of Bagdad begins with the introduction of the titular rascal, sweeping us straight into his escapades, and then building the wider plot and story-world outwards from there.Fairbanks's style was always extremely athletic and rhythmic, but the action of this one is almost akin to ballet. Doug dances his way through the role, and much of the movement seems literally choreographed, such as the three fat guards' heads popping up one after the other. The dance even carries through to the serene and tender love scenes. This balletic feel is made appropriate by the fantasy setting, which allows a more abstract approach, unlike all the other Fairbanks pictures which were rip-roaring adventures, but were grounded in (fairly) realistic worlds. The fantastical tone also makes acceptable the pantomime acting, such as the exaggerated yawn and stretch of the guard falling asleep, or Fairbanks's palms literally itching when he spies a precious jewel.As his director for this project Fairbanks selected Raoul Walsh. Walsh is now best remembered for the gritty action pictures he would later make at Warner Brothers, but perhaps the most important aspect he brought to his pictures was a romantic spirit of adventure. The fabulous sets were already built and the script locked down by the time Walsh came on board, but he adds his adventuresome touch in a number of ways. Walsh was very much an outdoors man, and many of his pictures emphasise the openness of plains and mountains, making them places of freedom, contrasting them with a stifling atmosphere for interiors. Thief of Bagdad, with its elaborate street sets and cavernous halls, has a less clear distinction between indoors and outdoors, but Walsh makes those very streets the equivalent of the open plain, keeping his camera back to show Fairbanks dancing freely through them. In the final half hour, notice how places such as the bazaar or the harbour where the bad princes seek their treasures are photographed as crowded or confined, with actors framed through doorways or amongst the clutter of the set. When we cut back to Fairbanks, he is in long shot in a wide-open space.It's also very like Walsh to make us feel as if we are there with the hero, taking part in his adventure. While those long shots rightly show of the magnificent sets and the hero's athletics, at crucial times Walsh brings us in close, often with the camera just behind Fairbanks, as if we were following him. Perhaps the most effective of these is in the fight with the lizard monster, in which we are literally brought in for the kill. We also get to see Walsh's sensitive side (rarely acknowledged, least of all by himself) in the romantic meetings between Fairbanks and his lady fair, embodied in this case by Julanne Johnson. These scenes are both tentative and passionate, with the most beautiful moment after he scales her balcony. We cut between two separate shots, one of Fairbanks kissing her arm, the other of her looking away. Their contact is slight, but filled with deep emotion.Thief of Bagdad comes from an era in which the walls between cinema and forms of expression such as ballet, opera and fine art were at their thinnest. Title cards are kept to a minimum, and yet this is not a collection of technical tricks like Murnau's Der Letzte Mann. Neither is it confusing or pretentiously highbrow. It tells its story visually, but still manages to be engaging and earthily human. It is the very essence of silent cinema.