47. A Fool There Was (1915)

Theda Bara was my first Silent Star crush, however it took me 25 years to get to the day when I'd finally see her star in a film. I pasted my walls with her pictures when I was 16, in her features I saw something familiar, something of times gone by.
Few of her films survive, I stumbled upon this one one by chance today, while searching for something else. Theda didn't disappoint. She was gutsy and alluring.

But the film itself, based on a play that was based on a poem, (neither of which I have read) dealt with alcoholism, though there were other things in it too. But it was the drinking thing that makes me wish I hadn't watched it.
To 99% of those who have watched this film, I bet it must be mighty amusing to watch the "Fool" crawling on the floor, delirious and drunken, but for me it's something too close to home. It's all too real.
So, um... Theda was brilliant but I'm too sensitive to watch films like this. Weird but true.

Theda was 30 when she played the part of The Vampire

Ossi Oswalda wore a similar dress in Ich möchte kein Mann sein (1918)

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Directed by Frank Powell