Drug comedies did not start in the acid and marijuana haze of the 1960s and 70s. They were making them all the way back in 1916. In this short film, star-on-the-rise Douglas Fairbanks carries on broadly as the subtly named Coke Ennyday, a constantly high detective who keeps a big vat of cocaine on his desk. He works here to bust up an opium den while he liberally samples the contraband. Every good action hero needs a gimmick and Coke Ennyday’s is that he sticks a syringe in his opponents and injects them with a little somethin’-somethin’ that gets them to stop fighting and start dancing with an oblivious facial expression.
Silly, goofball film and the silent movie equivalent to that old Cab Calloway record, “Reefer Man”. It would make a good opening act for a midnight screening of Reefer Madness.
The writers here were D.W. Griffith, Anita Loos, and Tod Browning.