18 August 2020

The Thief of Bagdad (1924)

Douglas Fairbanks was the star of the magical adventure The Thief of Bagdad (1924), directed by Raoul Walsh. This Arabian Nights fantasy tells the story of a recalcitrant thief who falls in love with the beautiful daughter of the Caliph of Baghdad. The imaginative special effects, including a flying carpet, a magic rope, and fearsome monsters and the massive Arabian-style sets are still amazing. The Thief of Bagdad was a box-office failure in 1924, but now it is seen as one of the great silent Hollywood films and one of Fairbanks's greatest works.

Douglas Fairbanks in The Thief of Bagdad (1924)
French postcard by Cinémagazine-Edition, no. 168. Sent by mail in Belgium in 1925. Photo: United Artists. Douglas Fairbanks in The Thief of Bagdad (Raoul Walsh, 1924).

The Thief of Bagdad (1924)
Dutch poster by Frans Bosen for The Thief of Bagdad (Raoul Walsh, 1924) starring Douglas Fairbanks.

Douglas Fairbanks
Swedish postcard by Stenders Kunstforlag, no. 37. Douglas Fairbanks in The Thief of Bagdad (Raoul Walsh, 1924).

The thief and the princess


The Thief of Bagdad (1924) opens and closes with a Holy Man (Charles Belcher) who raises his arm towards the glittering stars in the heavens spelling out "Happiness Must Be Earned." In between these words, the moral of the story is told to a young lad how The Thief earned his happiness.

Douglas Fairbanks plays The Thief, who robs as he pleases in the crowded city of Bagdad. Bare-chested and sporting baggy pants, he lives up to his title picking pockets and stealing food from the ledge of a balcony. Wandering into a mosque, he tells the holy man he disdains his religion; his philosophy is, "What I want, I take."

That night, he sneaks into the palace of the caliph using a magic rope he stole during ritual prayers. All thoughts of plunder are forgotten when he sees the sleeping princess (Julanne Johnston), the caliph's daughter. The princess's Mongol slave (Anna May Wong) discovers him and alerts the guards, but he gets away.

When his evil associate (Snitz Edwards) reminds the disconsolate Ahmed that a bygone thief once stole another princess during the reign of Haroun al-Rashid, Ahmed sets out to do the same. The next day is the princess's birthday. Three princes arrive, seeking her hand in marriage and the future inheritance of the city. Another of the princess's slaves foretells that she will marry the man who first touches a rose-tree in her garden.

The princess watches anxiously as first the glowering Prince of the Indies (Noble Johnson), then the obese Prince of Persia (Mathilde Comont in travesty), and finally, the Prince of the Mongols (Sôjin Kamiyama) pass by the rose-tree. The mere sight of the Mongol fills the princess with fear, but when Ahmed appears (disguised in stolen garments as a suitor), she is delighted. The Mongol slave tells her countryman of the prophecy, but before he can touch the rose-tree, Ahmed's startled horse tosses its rider into it.

That night, following ancient custom, the princess chooses Ahmed for her husband. Out of love, Ahmed gives up his plan to abduct her and confesses all to her in private. The Mongol prince learns from his spy, the princess's Mongol slave, that Ahmed is a common thief and informs the caliph. Ahmed is lashed mercilessly, and the caliph (Brandon Hurst) orders that he is torn apart by a giant ape, but the princess has the guards bribed to let him go.

When the caliph insists that she select another husband, her loyal slave advises her to delay. She asks that the princes each bring her a gift after "seven moons"; she will marry the one who brings her the rarest. In despair, Ahmed turns to the holy man. He tells the thief to become a prince, revealing to him the peril-fraught path to a great treasure.

The Prince of the Indies obtains a magic crystal ball from the eye of a giant idol, which shows whatever he wants to see, while the Persian prince buys a flying carpet. The Mongol prince leaves behind his henchman, telling him to organise the soldiers he will send to Bagdad disguised as porters. The potentate has sought all along to take the city; the beautiful princess is only an added incentive. After he lays his hands on a magic apple that has the power to cure anything, even death, he sends word to the Mongol slave to poison the princess. After many adventures, Ahmed gains a cloak of invisibility and a small chest of magic powder which turns into whatever he wishes when he sprinkles it. He races back to the city.

The three princes meet as agreed at a caravansary before returning to Bagdad. The Mongol asks the Indian to check whether the princess has waited for them. They discover that she is near death, and ride the flying carpet to reach her. Then the Mongol uses the apple to cure her. The suitors argue over which gift is rarest, but the princess points out that without anyone's gift, the remaining two would have been useless in saving her life. Her loyal slave shows her Ahmed in the crystal ball, so the princess convinces her father to deliberate carefully on his future son-in-law. The Mongol prince chooses not to wait, unleashing his secret army that night and capturing Bagdad.

Ahmed arrives at the city gate, shut and manned by Mongols. When he conjures up a large army with his powder, the Mongol soldiers flee. The Mongol prince is about to have one of his men kill him when the Mongol slave suggests he escape with the princess on the flying carpet. Ahmed liberates the city and rescues the princess, using his cloak of invisibility to get through the Mongols guarding their prince. In gratitude, the caliph gives his daughter to him in marriage.

Douglas Fairbanks in The Thief of Bagdad (1924)
German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 40/1. Photo: IFA / United Artists. Douglas Fairbanks in The Thief of Bagdad (Raoul Walsh, 1924).

Douglas Fairbanks in The Thief of Bagdad (1924)
German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 40/2. Photo: IFA / United Artists. Douglas Fairbanks in The Thief of Bagdad (Raoul Walsh, 1924).

Almost every frame is a work of art


With The Thief of Bagdad, Douglas Fairbanks sought to make an epic. The film was lavishly staged on a Hollywood studio set, at a reputed cost of $1,135,654.65. It was one of the most expensive films of the 1920s.

The Thief of Bagdad (1924) was made when Fairbanks was halfway through the heyday of that part of his career. He already had The Mark of Zorro (Fred Niblo, 1920), The Three Musketeers (Fred Niblo, 1921), and Robin Hood (Allan Dwan, 1922) behind him. The Thief was something of a departure, for it depended less on Fairbanks's ability to dance his way through physical stunts than it did on the Arabian Nights tableau which is presented on the screen.

Art director William Cameron Menzies was largely responsible for the production design. He closely followed the requirements laid down by Fairbanks, who acted as writer, producer, and star. Fairbanks' meticulous attention to detail, as well as complex visual imagery, required the use of state-of-the-art special effects, featuring a magic rope, a flying horse, a flying carpet, underwater sea monsters, and full-scale palace sets. Almost every frame is a work of art and amazingly, this was done long before computer animation.

Lugonian at IMDb: "The Thief of Bagdad is Douglas Fairbanks' finest hours on screen. Aside from being in a faraway land, Doug resumes his athletic skills as in previous films, ranging from visual stunts to his trademark smile. It's unlike anything he has ever done before and something that could only be accomplished on the screen once. Reportedly the first million-dollar production, every penny of it shows on screen."

Janiss Garza at AllMovie: " Fairbanks stole some of the special effects for his film from Fritz Lang's Der Müde Tod, which he had purchased for American distribution. The Thief of Baghdad, with its look of unrealistic beauty (courtesy of art director William Cameron Menzies), was not fully appreciated in its day. Because of its huge cost (two million dollars -- a real fortune in those days), it made little money. After that, Fairbanks stuck closer to the swashbuckling persona he felt his audience wanted."

In 1940, am excellent Technicolor remade was made under the same name, The Thief of Bagdad (Ludwig Berger, Michael Powell, Tim Whelan, Alexander Korda, Zoltan Korda, William Cameron Menzies, 1940) with June Deprez as the Princess and Conrad Veidt as Jaffar. The title character was played by Sabu, who was a sidekick for a handsome prince, John Justin as Prince Ahmad, rather than the leading man. The Fairbanks version doesn't include a genie from the magic lamp granting three wishes, but this version does.

A little more than thirty-five years later, M.G. Ramachandran assumed the role of Ali, the thief of Baghdad in the Indian production Baghdad Thirudan/Baghdad (T.R. Sundaram, 1960). The 1924 film was directly remade in Europe as Il Ladro di Bagdad/Thief of Bagdad (Bruno Vailati, Arthur Lubin, 1961), with Steve Reeves in the lead and Giorgia Moll as Princess Amina. In 1978, a made-for-television film, The Thief of Baghdad (Clive Donner 1978) starring Kabir Bedi and Roddy McDowall as Hasan the Thief, combined plot elements of these with others from the Sabu version.

Douglas Fairbanks in The Thief of Bagdad (1924)
German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 40/3. Photo: IFA / United Artists. Douglas Fairbanks in The Thief of Bagdad (Raoul Walsh, 1924).

Douglas Fairbanks and Julanne Johnston in The Thief of Bagdad (1924)
German postcard by Ross Verlag, Berlin, no. 40/4. Photo: IFA / United Artists. Douglas Fairbanks in The Thief of Bagdad (Raoul Walsh, 1924). Julanne Johnston played the Princess.

Sources: Lugonian (IMDb), Janiss Garza (AllMovie), Wikipedia, and IMDb.

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