THE AUTOMATIC MOTORIST (1911) – Balladeer’s Blog takes a look at another silent movie short by England’s Walter R. Booth. It’s a remake of his own 1906 short film The Mad Motorist but taken to the extreme. Running time is 6 1/2 minutes.
Booth more than lives up to his reputation as “the British Melies” with this light-hearted fantasy. A pair of newlyweds – as in the bride is still in her gown and the groom is still in his tux – visit their eccentric inventor friend.
The inventor’s newest creation is a robot which is skilled enough to serve as a chauffeur for the bride, groom and inventor. The robot drives off with its three passengers but the vehicle’s speed gets it pulled over by a traffic cop. When the robot punches the policeman he becomes infuriated.
The inventor orders his automatic motorist to drive off, which it does. The tenacious cop grabs hold of the rear bumper and gets dragged along in the best “Super Dave Osborne obvious dummy” tradition. A small dog has fastened its teeth to the policeman’s butt and goes along for the ride.
The car drives at high speed through the London streets. It can even climb walls and ride along the top of St. Paul’s Cathedral. With the cop and the dog still holding tight, the car flies to the moon and does a few laps.
From there it’s on to Saturn, where the robot-driven vehicle drives around the planet’s rings several times. At present, the car smashes a hole leading inside the hollow planet, where it frightens the native Saturnians – actors and actresses in body makeup & costumes and wielding metal lances.
The policeman chooses now of all times to let go of the car and he gets set upon by the Saturnians. They poke him with the pointed tips of their lances and beat him with the dull ends. The dog runs around playfully and is thankfully not attacked.
The robotic motorist drives the car back to Earth but the abandoned cop is made happy by introducing him to a lovely Saturnian woman with whom he starts canoodling.
The fantasy car drives through an alien landscape with large craters and then plunges underwater on some other celestial body before at last returning to Earth. A hunter shoots at the flying vehicle and its passengers and “brings down” the newlyweds and the inventor alive and well.
Neither the car nor its automatic motorist are seen again. Children might enjoy this short, but I was disappointed. Booth usually offers better productions than this, which was too slavishly Meliesesque.
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