Crossed Love and Swords

Louise Fazenda stands out doing a good job portraying an upper class proto-flapper in this Keystone short, which probably was a decent film for the era.

Most Keystone films don't hold up well to audiences over a hundred years later, this one is no exception. The slapstick humour, the bizarre makeup and exaggerated acting seem quite crude today in this mildly amusing story.

It's love among the elite in this Keystone from 1915, in which normal-looking people in well-fitting clothes go through the same sort of hi-jinks that the hoi polloi do. It's a couple of minutes before the first weird mustache appears and it took me twice that to recognize that bright eyed, lanky girl with the snub nose as Louise Fazenda.

It's pieces like this that make you realize that the players at Keystone were not just people who could fall on their behinds and bounce up again as if they were made of springs and steel. They were actors, sometimes fine actors, who could also fall on their behinds and bounce up again as if they were made of springs and steel.

It's a straight competition for the hand of Louise, gradually escalating into a duel and rescuing a dog from alligators and the actors perform their roles very well. Mack Sennett was always trying something new and this was an early attempt to break away from the bizarre clowns that were already becoming old hat. It was an experiment he would not repeat soon.

A social dance breaks up in a rough house, the rivals quarreling over Louise and her dog. One of them sets it adrift on the lake. This starts things moving. A low comedy number containing a lot of laughable nonsense. - The Moving Picture World, May 29, 1915