The Rivals

For its time, this Edison comedy makes good use of the familiar idea of a romantic rivalry. The characters are a little plain, but the situation and the gag ideas are enough to carry the movie and to make it amusing most of the time.

Most of the story follows the various dirty tricks that two young men play on each other as they each try to court the same woman. Some of the sequences are pretty good, and it also helps that most of it was filmed outdoors. The movie was based on a comic strip of the era, and one or two of the gags would come off better in a comic, but the rest of it works.

The outcome is rather predictable, but it is funny enough anyway. The lively nature of the movie makes up for its little shortcomings, and it is at least average for a comedy of the era.

Two young men court the same girl and try to wreck each other's efforts. One sabotages the other's car, while the other hands the first one a bunch of cigars, which promptly explode when the girl's father lights one up.

It's an amusing comedy from Edwin S. Porter, based on a contemporary comic strip. Although the print I looked at was too blurry to figure out who played which role, back in an era when the players were not identified, that was not too important a distinction. The audience was probably unaware that the director was Porter.

For me, the most amusing thing in the film is the young woman's indifference to which of the two young men she is necking with; they switch places, she returns to spooning.