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Coke Ennyday, the scientific detective, divides his own time in periods for "Sleep", "Eat", "Dope" and "Drink". In fact he's used to overcome every situation with drugs: consuming it to increase his energies or injecting it in his opponents to KO them. To help the police he discovers a contraband of opium (which he eagerly tastes) transported with "Leaping Fishes", and the blackmail of a mysterious man who wants to marry the "fish blower" girl. Will Coke be able to free the girl ? Written by
Spider Baby <spider@on-the-road.com>
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This very strange comedy from 1916 features a not-quite-yet-a-star Douglas Fairbanks (Senior) as Coke Ennyday, a bumbling private detective who spends most of his time injecting, snorting, or otherwise ingesting opium & cocaine products. ("Coke Ennyday" - get it?)
There's neat-o effects like backwards film to show Ennyday leaping out of water or onto rafters, as well as some minor slapstick, but the film's not all that funny, just weird. A recurring image is Ennyday looking a bit down, hand propping up his drooping face, the other reaching into his rope where a a belt of syringes is strapped around his chest. He'll take a syringe, inject himself, & then his face will beam with happiness.
Was drug humor like this popular in the 1910s? Did people really have that sort of knowledge about what cocaine could do? I don't really know, but for the modern audience - I saw this last night & the crowd ate it up - its utter strangeness & the farce that drug use is returned to is sure to please.