The 34 year old D.W. Griffith allows his actors to free themselves of their ethnic past (due to the fact that some of them came over from Australia, Germany, Hungary, etc) in order to reinvent themselves as American characters. This short film is a mask.
2 Reviews
The audience heaves a sigh of relief
deickemeyer28 July 2014
Warning: Spoilers
In this Biograph picture two common subjects are treated very graphically. One is the necessity of having poisonous liquids in a bottle different from others, and the other is the utility of the telephone in times of great hurry. A mother goes away and leaves a little girl to care for a sick grandmother. The mother takes by mistake the bottle of medicine prepared for the patient, leaving a bottle of poisonous liniment in its place, after carefully instructing her little daughter about giving the medicine to her grandmother. The acting when the little one begins to prepare for the administering of the medicine is especially good. Fortunately the little girl meets with three accidents, otherwise the dose would have been given. Frantically the mother tries to get her home on the telephone, but central is busy discussing the latest hats. Finally, however, it is done and the audience heaves a sigh of relief. The action in some parts is too long drawn out. The subject is one of those homely every-day occurrences which is certain to attract favorable comment. - The Moving Picture World, April 3, 1909
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