The Vengeance of the Fakir (1912)
The picture opens with a street scene in a mountain village. It is a temperate region; not all India is in the tropics. A few dark-skinned and turbaned natives are seated before the reed-thatched huts and the fakir is in their midst teaching them. A company of British soldiers on horses is seen approaching. As they ride into the village, the peasants scatter, but the old fakir remains seated. The English captain commands him to leave the narrow way, so that his men can pass. He pays no attention and the captain strikes him in the face with his riding whip. As though stung to the quick, the old man leaps up and stands aside, his face scowling in hatred, while the cavalcade rides unconcerned away. The fakir, helped by his friends, plans a complicated vengeance for the blow on his face. It had to be accomplished subtly; because it is to be against the ruling race. He makes use of a queer man, a veiled creature, like the "cat man" of one of Kipling's stories. This mysterious being, with the help of an obedient tiger, steals the English captain's son. When the child is gone, the authorities suspect foul play; but are not sure, since the tiger's presence makes it seem also a wild beast's act. A search is instituted and the huts of the peasants are ransacked. A British officer is even shown the baby; but its face and hands have been colored and it is passed as an Indian child. Years pass: The child has been brought up by the priest. It adds to our interest to see him passing among the white people as black. He stains himself every day, as a religious exercise and perhaps doesn't suspect, even when he has become a grown lad, that his skin is much whiter than the priest's. The Brahmin caste springs from the white stock and many of them are still almost as white as the English. A love story is now introduced, which soon works out to the final nullification of the vengeance. The priest's lad falls in love with an English girl. This love episode follows the natural and expected course under the circumstances. The girl admires the high-born native lad and accepts flowers from him, but her friends could hardly be expected to encourage the affair. The opposition ends with the discovery of the lad's white origin and of his parentage which, after a breathless climax, the rescue of the girl from a wild leopard by the lad, is wrung from the thoroughly frightened fakir.
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GenresDrama
Short
IMDbPro
See more details at IMDbPro
| Filmmakers | Role |
|---|---|
| Henry J. Vernot | Director |
| Cast | Role |
|---|---|
| Alec B. Francis | |
| Will E. Sheerer | |
| George Larkin | |
| Mildred Bright |
