director: Unknown
years: 1927/ 1928
country: USA
history notes: Unidentified Film No. 156
alternative titles: Die Bubikopfbanditen

This film has been identified thanks to contributions from members of the Lost FIlms community.

Slapstick comedy. In the Wild West. Bobby, the new director of the Dollar Mine [Sid Smith, see frame scan 2] and his Afro-American servant [in blackface, see frame scan 3] are totally clumsy and inept. They travel across the desert with a donkey that has been furnished as an office [frame scan 4]. Meanwhile, the gang of "Bubikopfbandits" make themselves up in preparation for an ambush [frame scans 5-7]. The administrator of the Dollar Mine has misappropriated the will ascribing the mine to the young, pretty and just Erbin [frame scan 8]. Following a chase through the mine, Bobby is able to recover the will, chase away the Bubikopfbandits, defeat the crooked trustee in the getaway and win the heart of the pretty mine owner.

Cast: Sid Smith
Production Company: William M. Pizor Productions, New York
Length: 492m
Format: 35mm, 1.33:1
Picture/Sound: b/w, silent
Notes: 'Zeiss-Ikon' (Süd-Film logo) and 'Kodak A.G.' (rest of film) edgecodes

Source notes
Deutsche Kinemathek - Museum für Film und Fernsehen

The permit card of the German film censorship office survives in the Bundesarchiv-Filmarchiv: 27.12.1929, Nr. 2462, 2 Acts, 524m, jugendverbot [forbidden to young people]
Producer (according to the permit card): Pizors Pictures, New York. Probably means: William M. Pizor Productions. German Distributor: Südfilm A.G., Berlin [frame scan 1]
We are looking for the original title of this slapstick comedy.

As obscure as all other Pizor productions of the period, the original title was "Bob Hair Bandits". The earliest screening of the title that I can identify was in support of the Pola Negri feature "Loves of an Actress" at the Paramount Theatre, Connellsville, Pennsylvania, on January 7th and 8th, 1929.
See: Connellsville Daily Courier, January 7th, 1929, p,8.

Further research reveals "Bob Hair Bandits" to be a corruption of the full original title, which was "Bobbed Hair and Bandits" (1927).

The earliest identifiable screening of the film took place at the Nevada Theatre in Reno, Nevada, on 12th December 1927. Pizor subsequently submitted the title to the New York censor in 1928, and the New York State Archive (http://iarchives.nysed.gov/MPD/rr_other_film_search.jsp) has paperwork holdings relating to this submission:
Motion Picture Film Title: Bobbed Hair and Bandits
Date: 1928
Country: United States
Directors: ---
Writer: ---
Manufacturers: Capital Prod
Exchange: Fineart Dist Corp
Determination: Approved
File # - Box #: 7243-2678

The above-mentioned 'Capital Prod' (sometimes also recorded as Capitol Prod) is named as manufacturer/distributor in relation to several Pizor shorts from this period.

The extreme similarity of the titles "Die Bubikopfbanditen" and "Bob[bed] Hair [and] Bandits" cannot be overlooked, and certainly this appears to be the only likely candidate among the Pizor/Smith comedies, which also include: ALICE BLUES; DON'T FORGET (not this film, based on stills); HAREM SCAREM (extant, and not this film); HEAVE-HO! (extant, and not this film); A HOBO'S JEST (extant, and not this film); IN BAD; LUNCHES AND PUNCHES (extant, and not this film); MIND YOUR BUSINESS; OH! WHAT A NURSE!; ONE SPOOKY KNIGHT (extant, and not this film); THE SHE-BEAST; WINNING OUT.