Douglas Fairbanks Pictures

Allan Dwan's A Modern Musketeer is a brisk Douglas Fairbanks comedy from the peak of his silent years, built on the short story "D'Artagnan of Kansas" by Eugene P. Lyle Jr. Fairbanks plays Ned Thacker, a Kansas boy raised on The Three Musketeers who dreams of chivalric adventure and gets more than he bargained for on a trip out west, where he single-handedly tangles with a bandit, rescues a damsel, and leapt from moving cars with the boundless energy that made Fairbanks a star. Produced by Fairbanks's own company and distributed by Artcraft, the film features an early appearance by ZaSu Pitts and cinematography by Victor Fleming, who would later direct The Wizard of Oz. As a 1917 release the film is securely in the United States public domain.

Adventure · Comedy · Silent

A sequel to The Mark of Zorro (1920), with Douglas Fairbanks now playing Don Cesar, the son of the original Zorro, in Spain rather than California. Framed for the murder of a rival archduke, he fakes his death and returns to clear his name and win back the woman he loves. Fairbanks produced and starred, and Donald Crisp directed while also playing Don Cesar's father. The swordplay is elaborate even by Fairbanks's standards, and the film leans into the swashbuckling spectacle that made him the action star of the silent era. Published in 1925, it is in the public domain in the United States.

Adventure · Action · Romance · Silent

Douglas Fairbanks swashbuckles through twelfth-century England as the Earl of Huntingdon turned outlaw, scaling walls and leaping from battlements to win Maid Marian from the usurping Prince John. Allan Dwan directed this lavish silent epic, built around one of the largest sets ever constructed. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Adventure · Romance · Action

The first screen appearance of Zorro, and the film that turned Douglas Fairbanks from a modern comedian into the swashbuckler who defined an era. Based on Johnston McCulley's 1919 story "The Curse of Capistrano," it follows Don Diego Vega, a foppish aristocrat newly returned to old California, who dons a mask and cape at night to fight the corrupt oppressors of the common people and court the lovely Lolita Pulido. Fairbanks's athleticism is the engine of the picture: he leaps over rooftops, fences with whip-crack speed, and carves his signature "Z" into the scenery. The masked-avenger template it set would echo through every costumed hero to follow. Produced by Fairbanks's own company, it was the first picture released through United Artists. Published in 1920, it is in the public domain in the United States.

Romance · Adventure · Silent

A silent comedy starring Douglas Fairbanks, directed by Theodore Reed. Fairbanks plays Charlie Butters, an eccentric inventor and self-styled "scientific detective" who tries to win the heart of a beautiful social worker by helping her rescue a young woman from white slavery. The film was intended as a spoof of the detective genre and a showcase for Fairbanks's athletic comedy, but it was one of his few box office disappointments. Still, Fairbanks's boundless energy and physical virtuosity are on full display, and the film offers a fascinating glimpse of the star testing material that would later inform his swashbuckling adventures. The film is in the public domain.

Comedy · Silent

A silent romantic fantasy-adventure on a scale that still startles. Douglas Fairbanks plays a thief of Bagdad who, on a whim, sneaks into the Caliph's palace, steals an apple, and falls in love with the Princess. To win her he must best rival princes in a quest across a world of magic: a flying horse, a six-armed statue, an underwater kingdom, a monstrous spider, an invisibility powder. Raoul Walsh directs from a scenario Fairbanks co-wrote under a pseudonym, and the production design draws on the illustrations of Edmund Dulac to build an Arabian Nights dreamscape out of lumber, paint, and ingenuity. Anna May Wong is a standout as the treacherous Mongol slave. The film's influence on the fantasy genre is hard to overstate. Published in 1924, it is in the public domain in the United States.

Romance · Fantasy · Adventure · Silent

The young swordsman d'Artagnan arrives in Paris and joins the King's Musketeers, pledging all for one against the scheming Cardinal Richelieu and the treacherous Milady. Douglas Fairbanks stars in this lavish silent swashbuckler. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Adventure · Romance · Action