The Mystery of the Leaping Fish
The Mystery of the Leaping Fish is a 1916 American short silent comedy film starring Douglas Fairbanks, Bessie Love, and Alma Rubens. Directed by John Emerson, the story was written by Tod Browning with intertitles by Anita Loos.
In this unusually broad comedy for Fairbanks, the acrobatic leading man plays Coke Ennyday, a cocaineshooting detective who is a parody of Sherlock Holmes. Ennyday is given to injecting himself from a bandolier of syringes worn across his chest, and liberally helps himself to the contents of a hatboxsized round container of white powder labeled COCAINE on his desk.Fairbankss character otherwise lampoons Sherlock Holmes with checkered detective hat, clothes and even car, along with the aforementioned propensity for injecting cocaine whenever he feels momentarily down, then laughing with delight. A device used for observing visitors, which is referred to in the title cards as his scientific periscope, bears a close resemblance to a modern closedcircuit television. What is apparently a clock face has EATS, DRINKS, SLEEPS, and DOPE instead of numbers. ........
Source: Wikipedia
