The Bat **** (1926, Jack Pickford, Louise Fazenda) – Classic Movie Review 13,803

A masked criminal dressed like a giant bat terrorises the guests at spooky old country house rented by a mystery writer, in Roland West’s 1926 American silent comedy mystery film The Bat.

Jack Pickford and Louise Fazenda star in writer/ producer/ director Roland West’s 1926 American silent comedy mystery film The Bat, based on the 1920 Broadway hit play The Bat by Mary Roberts Rinehart and Avery Hopwood. The Bat is a superb silent film, quite awesome, then and now greatly esteemed for its visuals, with exceptional cinematography, sets and special effects.

As well as producing and directing, Roland West also did the adaptation (uncredited), though the titles are by George Marion Jr and the continuity is by Julien Josephson. It is an extremely striking looking movie. The all-important photography is by Arthur Edeson and Gregg Toland (uncredited), with settings by William Cameron Menzies.

Though the story is set in a spooky country house, it was shot primarily on sound stages at the Roland West Studios in Fort Lee, New Jersey, just across the Hudson River from Manhattan. The interior sets of the haunted mansion, secret passages and the Bat lair were all constructed on those sound stages.

West filmed at night, saying: ‘Given the quiet of the studio at midnight, when no other companies are working, and plenty of spooky music from an orchestra, the players really are in a mood to simulate dark deeds.’ The production notes say that West had his cast ‘work at night to avoid daytime studio traffic’.

The Bat premiered in New York on March 14, 1926.

The 1926 film The Bat was considered lost for decades, until a print was discovered in the 1980s, and it is now available in the public domain. It is beautifully restored by UCLA from a rare 35mm nitrate print.

You can find it without sound here: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bat_(1926_film)

You can find it with a soundtrack here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=ckRpvSfm5C8&t=1s

The villain in both films inspired Bob Kane to create his Batman character.

West filmed it again in a 1930 sound version called The Bat Whispers.

It was made again as The Bat in 1959 with Vincent Price.

The play The Bat was based on Mary Roberts Rinehart’s own 1908 mystery novel The Circular Staircase, first filmed in 1915 by the Selig Polyscope Company before Mary Roberts Rinehart’s 1920 Broadway theatre version. The 1915 silent version of The Bat is considered a lost film.

Cast: Emily Fitzroy as Miss Cornelia Van Gorder, Jack Pickford as Brooks Bailey, Jewel Carmen as Miss Dale Ogden, Robert McKim as Dr. H. E. Wells, Arthur Housman as Richard Fleming, Louise Fazenda as Lizzie Allen, Tullio Carminati as Detective Moletti, Eddie Gribbon as Detective Anderson, George Beranger as Gideon Bell, Charles Herzinger as Courtleigh Fleming, Sojin Kamiyama as Billy the Butler, Lee Shumway as the Unknown, Stanton Heck as Police Officer.

© Derek Winnert 2025 – Classic Movie Review 13,803

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