. . . can only be defeated by really fast young skinny guys with great comic timing and super-human gymnastic skills. Of course, future film legend Douglas Fairbanks turns in his best performance in THE MARK OF ZORRO, since he WAS still relatively young, unknown, and poor in 1920. But as in ANIMAL FARM (or as with today's "upcoming" political "leaders," or as with many of today's Powerball and Mega-Millions big winners, or as in the plot of THE MARK OF ZORRO itself) both those born into wealth and those who have riches thrust upon them (or serve as Big Money's Henchpeople) soon grow into the very sort of piggish Enemies of the People whom they themselves had despised when poor. Only the threat of losing their wealth can sometimes temporarily bring these folks back on the side of angels, as happens here with Zorro (and, in an ancillary sense, with his main squeeze, Lolita Pulido). By the end of the 1920s, Hollywood's Fat Cats--including the aging Fairbanks himself--had banded together to form the elitist guilds, free-thought censorship codes, and pattern of persecuting the young & poor & creative classes (in other words, everything Zorro fought AGAINST!).

As beloved as the 1940 Tyrone Power version is, this prototype of all Zorro movies is a must see, even for viewers who don't usually watch silent films.The movie makes up for its lack of aural excitement by staging the sword fights as rousing, comic duels, rather than deadly encounters. Who can forget the image of the black clad Zorro sitting cross legged on a tavern table, eating from a bowl of nuts with one hand, while fending off Sergeant Gonzales with his right? Zorro's dashing escapes and clever tricks are definitely played for comedy in most scenes. Douglas Fairbanks, Senior also plays Zorro's quieter moments with a rascally humor as well. In one memorable scene, he climbs over the garden wall of a beautiful senorita and kisses her, much to her surprise. When she slaps him, he laughs heartily. This seems to me the essence of Fairbanks in one image. The movie doesn't play everything for laughs, however. The villains are dastardly and wicked in an old fashioned melodrama way, and many romantic and adventure scenes are played completely straight. But it is the image of the masked, cigar smoking, laughing Zorro taunting his enemies, though outnumbered twenty to one ,that remains with me. Fairbanks also has a fine comic turn as the insipid, ineffectual fop Don Diego, pretending to admire Sergeant Gonzales' boasts that he'll show that bandit, if he can ever find him. Noah Beery Senior is a marvelous Gonzales, rowdy, boisterous, hard drinking, crude and macho. He makes a great comic villain for Zorro to oppose, while Robert McKim has a more serious bad guy role, as the lecherous soldier who attempts to steal the heroine's virtue, and is soundly defeated in a duel by the enraged Diego. A delightful musical score accompanies the movie, with tango rhythms and tender romantic themes. This is a true classic, that deserves to be seen by all lovers of adventure movies and dashing, romantic heroes coming to the rescue of beautiful ladies.

A vehicle for Douglas Fairbanks to swashbuckle about and fight oppression and win the hand of the lovely Lolita Pulido (Marguerite de la Motte), who not surprisingly despises the pallid Don Diego and loves the tushing Zorro. Fairbanks keeps his shirt on, but moves with considerable nimbleness. The Bad Guy is tall Captain Juan Ramon (Robert McKim), something of a would-be-swashbuckler himself, but a bully and craven and a kidnapper of reluctant maidens. Also bad is the judge who condemns the saintly Franciscan friar Fray Felipe (Walt Whitman—no, not the poet) to fifteen lashes, and the governor, too, who is not only a tyrant but appears to be poorly groomed. The Old California sets and landscapes are nice, familiar from countless westerns, but somehow quite refreshingly old. The "natives" are actually First Nations people, and they retain some dignity even under oppression and even under well-meaning Zorrovian interventions.

I consider Douglas Fairbanks Sr to be kind of the "Patron Saint" of the modern-day blockbuster spectaculars and I can picture him looking down and smiling every summer when the latest crop of these action epics are released. THE MARK OF ZORRO, THE THREE MUSKETEERS, ROBIN HOOD, THE THIEF OF BAGDAD, THE BLACK PIRATE and THE GAUCHO always strike me as the cinematic forerunners of the feel-good, two-fisted, special-effects-laden works that today's studios unleash for summer and Christmas. With DON Q,SON OF ZORRO and THE IRON MASK he could even be considered the "Patron Saint" of blockbuster sequels. To be sure those who have followed in his footsteps lack his mastery of the medium and debatably only RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK has the true "Fairbanks Aura" around it. THE MARK OF ZORRO is a masterpiece for any filmmaking era and is a perfect film to use to introduce people to silent films. Always a shrewd showman Fairbanks pounced on the rights to Johnston McCulley's story THE CURSE OF CAPISTRANO, the tale that introduced "The Robin Hood of Old California" to the world. No matter what heights he'd go on to scale in his later films this one may represent Fairbanks' artistry in it's purest form. So much praise is heaped on the action scenes in this classic that viewers often overlook Doug's terrific job portraying both the foppish Don Diego and his athletic alter ego El Zorro. (When I first saw RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK the contrast between Harrison Ford's bookish, awkward mannerisms for Dr. Jones in the classroom and his agile, confident body language as the whip-wielding Indy reminded me of Fairbanks in THE MARK OF ZORRO.) Younger viewers who might otherwise sneer at silent movies like this might be persuaded to give it a chance by pointing out to them that no less an action star than Jackie Chan often praises Douglas Fairbanks in the same breath with Buster Keaton as one of his influences. THE MARK OF ZORRO all by itself earned Douglas Fairbanks his title as cinema's Swashbuckler-In-Chief.