Oct 121931
 
one reel

Vaguely sinister stuff happens.

Not enough of a synopsis?

OK, Iā€™ll write more, but ā€œstuff happensā€ really covers it. So, master criminal The Phantom escapes from jail before his execution, using a train and a plane. He seems to want revenge on DA John Hampton (Wilfred Lucas), and thenā€¦ Heā€™s out of the picture. Reporter Dick Mallory (Guinn ā€˜Big Boyā€™ Williams) shows up at the DAā€™s house pretending to be The Phantom to get a story as he needs a big break to make enough money to reveal his secret engagement to Ruth Hampton (Allene Ray). Iā€™d have thought not mucking with his fiancĆ©eā€™s father would be a good idea, but thatā€™s just me. Police Sgt. Pat Collins runs around the house pushing people around, particularly the butler. Dickā€™s employer also shows up at the house for no clear reason; he wants to marry Ruth as well but donā€™t expect anything to come of that. Then the movie starts over at the halfway point. Yup. Iā€™m not kidding. Dick, Ruth, Lucy the Maid (Violet Knights) and Shorty the Chauffeur (Bobby Dunn) go to investigate mad scientist Dr. Weldon (William Gould) at a local insane asylum, and Weldon is happy for the guests as heā€™s been looking for a subject for his brain experiments. Then someone is said to be The Phantom, but for no reason and contradicting everything thatā€™s gone before.

This is fascinating. Not good, but fascinating. What kind of development did this film go through? Did they just squish multiple scripts together? Was there ever a single script?Ā Did one individual ever read through it? Was there anyone thinking, ā€œYes, this is the story I want to tellā€? Itā€™s just over an hour long, and nothing in the first 30 minutes has any connection to the ending.

Thereā€™s some nice stuff in the last half. The asylum is stylishly designed and the inmates are both creepy and funny. I donā€™t know why a known criminal (Dr. Weldon had to go on the run when a body was found on his property) is allowed to run a sanitarium, nor why the police donā€™t show up to arrest a fugitive since they know the place as ā€œWeldonā€™s Sanatariumā€ but then why should that part of the film make sense? Since we only have 30 minutes at the asylum, thereā€™s not enough time spent developing Weldon and his strange brain experiments. Thereā€™s actually a good, and semi-coherent horror film that could have been made from this segment if it had been expanded. But it wasnā€™t so we could instead see that prison break (why?), and watch a guy on the phone during the prison break (why?), and have a scene at the newspaper office (why?).

Strangely for such a cheap and sloppy picture, the sets look great. My guess is that several projects fell apart (one with nice sets) and wanting something to release, they just stuck whatever they had together. I canā€™t recommend sitting through the result.