Rainbow Island
About Rainbow Island
Harold Lloyd and Snub Pollard are fishing from a canoe when Harold finds a bottle. The paper inside is a map of Rainbow Island with an X for buried treasure. Ten days later they land, drink from a stream, and are captured. The chief has them carried to a hut and sends for the queen to choose light meat or dark. She picks Snub for dinner and lets Harold walk around. The tribe tries to fatten Snub at a banquet. He gets away, and the two of them dump a series of tribesmen, one of them upside down into the cooking pot, then row off.
Cast & crew
More about Rainbow Island
Billy Gilbert directed. H. M. Walker wrote the titles. Hal Roach produced it. Walter Lundin photographed it. Della Mullady edited. Pathé Exchange released the one-reel comedy on 28 October 1917. It runs 6 minutes. Production number L-4. Shooting was 23–30 July 1917. Bebe Daniels is credited, along with a long company list that includes William Blaisdell, Sammy Brooks, and Fred C. Newmeyer.
Themes
Making
Roach's unit put Lloyd and Pollard in a canoe, then on an island, and got the reel out in a week of shooting.
Look
Walter Lundin shot the canoe, the bottle, and the hut where the queen makes her choice.
Preservation
The short survives.
Notes
- The queen's choice is a joke about meat: light or dark. She takes Snub and lets Harold go.
- Fred C. Newmeyer, later a Lloyd director, is in the cast list.
- The film survives. Wikipedia lists it as extant.
- Lord Heath times the shoot as one week at the end of July 1917.
Scenes
- Harold pulls a bottle from the water and reads a map with an X on Rainbow Island.
- The queen looks the two of them over and picks Snub as the meal.
- A tribesman goes into the cooking pot headfirst, and the canoe leaves.
Also available
- Internet Archive (rainbow-island-1917-directed-by-billy-gilbert)
