Dan Navarro's Movie Reviews

Laura LaPlante was a bright and enduring light in early Hollywood, appearing in silent films from her teens and later making a successful transition to the talkies. A petite blonde charmer, she appeared as a Bathing Beauty in Al Christie comedy shorts, and later became one of the most versatile of film stars, appearing not only in comedies, but romantic dramas and thrillers as well.

Today, Laura's best-known films—because they are the most accessible—are probably the creepy/funny horror movie The Cat and the Canary (1927) and the 1929 part-talkie Show Boat, in which she played Magnolia Hawks in the first film version of the famous Edna Ferber novel. But I'm guessing her best performance came in Her Big Night (1926), an unalloyed comedy delight in which she kicks up her heels in two roles: as Frances, a shopgirl who closely resembles big movie star Daphne Dix, and as the impetuous movie star herself.

One night when Daphne is frolicking aboard a millionaire's yacht when she should be attending the big premiere of her latest film, her studio's press agent spots Frances and offers her $1,000 to pose as Miss Dix at the premiere and throw a few kisses to her loyal fans. The deception works, but it also leads to several humorous complications that keep this frothy comedy bubbling at a merry pace.

Among the comedy highlights is Mack Swain—who had played the giant prospector, "Big Jim," in the previous year's The Gold Rush—as the studio head who gives Frances lessons on how to prance and curtsy daintily before Daphne's fans. The sight of this lumbering hulk of a man trying to display feminine grace and charm is screamingly funny, and once you see it you won't soon forget it.

Miss LaPlante is perfect in her roles as the shopgirl and the movie star she resembles. The two women get to know each other well, and in the film's final scene—after all the plot complications have been resolved—they say farewell with a kiss, in a triumph of film technology. For it is Laura LaPlante, kissing herself, and seamlessly. The two mirror images are juxtaposed with no technical flaws. Before we can ask ourselves, How in hell did they do that? the film fades to black and we are left with a happy glow, like the sensation of having just finished a tasty dessert.

It's unfortunate that the copyright owners of Her Big Night have not seen fit to restore the film and release it to the public on videotape or on DVD. Not yet, anyway. But silent movie fans in and around Los Angeles can view the picture on a Movieola machine at the UCLA Film Archives.

This film is also known as Local Girl Makes Good.