The Live Wire (1925) User Reviews

An otherwise dull movie with a glorious action climax!

[JohnHowardReid · 7/10 · 6 October 2014]

The team of Johnny Hines (comedian) and Charles Hines (Johnny's brother, director) doesn't exactly hit immediate pay dirt in this First National venture. True, there are some amusing moments and the story is not without interest – particularly when it finally settles down about halfway through and introduces a heroine, Mildred Ryan, her upright businessman dad, Barney Sherry, and his crooked partner played by hissable villain, Bradley Barker. It all comes to a glorious action climax on which the producers, First National, have obviously spent a fair amount of cash. All the same, one wonders how this framework would have appealed to contemporary audiences as it stretches out the running time to around two hours. What we have on the Sunrise Silents DVD is an 85 minutes condensation, and that too incorporates a fair amount of marking time as dreary old jokes like the constant reselling of the same pair of animals to a butcher who isn't a fraction as smart as he thinks he is, are vigorously reshuffled. All in all, despite the rousing climax, this movie isn't a fraction as delightful as "Conductor 1492". "The Live Wire" was available on a somewhat washed-out but watchable Sunrise Silents DVD.