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A Modern Knight
Also known as A Bonehead Cowboy in the USA
(1916) United States of America
B&W : Two reels
Directed by William Bertram
Cast: Art Acord [Percival Cadwallader ‘Pin’ Perkins], Nita Davis [Ruby], Ashton Dearholt [Frank, Ruby’s outlaw husband], Clarence Barton [Jackson, the movie director], Al W. Fordyce [Burt], Bessie Banks [Mary], George Gerhardt [Pete], Harry McCabe [Jim], Carl Morrison [the stagecoach driver]
American Film Manufacturing Company production; distributed by Mutual Film Corporation [Mustang]. / Scenario by Karl R. Coolidge, from a screen story by B.M. Bower (Bertha Muzzy Sinclair). / Released 23 June 1916. / Standard 35mm spherical 1.33:1 format. / Working title: Like a Knight of Old. The film was rereleased in the USA as A Bonehead Cowboy in 1921.
Drama.
Synopsis: [?] [From The Moving Picture World]? Percival Cadwallader Perkins was so bashful that whenever a woman would look at him he would blush like a beet, and this brought the “Happy Family,” the cowboys of the Flying U, to calling him “Pink.” Seeking real atmosphere, the Climax Motion Picture Company comes to the west. In search of some strays, Pink from a distance sees a woman struggling fiercely with a man, and dashes to the rescue. He tears the man from the girl, and kicks him down a small bluff. And then he finds that he has interrupted the filming of a moving picture scene. Jackson, the director, calls Ruby, the leading woman aside, and tells her to make love to Pink and keep him hanging around, that it would be a good thing to have him working in the pictures. Ruby certainly succeeds so well that in a short time Pink proposes to her. She, too, has fallen in love, but she tells him that she is already married, but that her husband had treated her so brutally that she left him. A stagecoach hold-up is arranged. But two crooks overhear their plans and conclude to take a hand themselves. The stage is stopped, and the passengers get out and line up, all thinking it is but a movie stunt. From a distance Pink watches, his cue being to rush in when a shot is fired. But when he makes a run towards the scene, a bullet from one of the men clips his ear. He rides to them, and furiously upbraids them for using real cartridges when they are only supposed to use blanks. For reply, one of the crooks knocks him down, and grabbing Ruby, they throw her into the stage, and the driver is ordered to move along. Down the road a little farther the moving picture company is waiting. But the stage passes them on the run, and then it develops that a real hold-up has been perpetrated. Inside the stage Ruby is held by one of the crooks, who unmasks, and she recognizes her husband. While on the top of the stagecoach the other crook and the driver are in a fierce fight. Pink and the cowboys give chase to the stage, which is fast approaching a broken bridge. Pink manages to pull Ruby from the stage just as it goes over a cliff. The crooks are both killed, and now that she is free, Ruby gladly consents to marry Pink.
Survival status: Print exists in the Library of Congress film archive.
Current rights holder: Public domain [USA].
Listing updated: 8 November 2022.
References: Katchmer-Eighty p. 6 : Website-IMDb.
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