'Doctor Cupid' is predictable but still well-done

Doctor Cupid (1911)
Starring: John Bunny, Carlyle Blackwell, and Edith Storey
Director: Unknown

Rating: Seven of Ten Stars

A young poet (Blackwell) disguises himself as a doctor to get around the overly protective father (Bunny) of the woman he loves (Storey).

Although mostly forgotten today, John Bunny was a comedian who became an international screen star during the early days of film. Reportedly, he tended to stay away from slapstick and physical comedy and instead focused on more character- and relationship-based material. That is certainly the case in "Doctor Cupid", which is one of only a handful of the roughly 300 films he appeared in that survive to the present day.

"Doctor Cupid" runs a little over 12 minutes and it doesn't waste a second with its fast-moving, proto-sitcom story that straddles the line between comedy and melodrama. The characters all take the unfolding events very seriously, but there's a sense that the audience isn't necessarily supposed to, from Bunny's obtuse character nodding off during a poetry reading to his daughter becoming literally love-sick when she is forbidden to see the man she barely knows yet has decided is the love of her life. There's the occassional over-emoting that one expects from films of this period, but generally the actors deliver performances that are more in line with what you'd expect from a well-performed stage production. Overall, everyone does an impressive job, especially since there is not a single moment where an actor seems unsure of where they're to direct their energy or where they're supposed to stand in the shot. (There's one bit where Edith Storey's back is to the camera for an awkwardly long period of time, but other than that, the framing of each shot and the actors positioning within it is well above average in competence for films of this period.

If you're in the mood for a bit of light entertainment that occupies a space between a sitcom and a French farce, I think you'll enjoy "Doctor Cupid"; you can watch it right here, right now, as it's embedded below. (And if I steer you wrong, feel free to sound off by leaving a comment beneath this post.)