Are you dense? The first Sheik portrayed an Arab Sheik (‘half white/half Arab’ for the codes of the time) as a rapist…but he didnt murder or steal from anyone. I guess snatching the girl would be opportunistic but thats a far stretch. The Sheik of that film is shown as educated, and brave, though a touch ‘wild’.

Valentino hated the way Arabs were stereotyped in that film and said so. He intended to make a film called The Hooded Falcon which would show Moorish folk (Spanish/Arab) in a sympathetic heroic light. Sadly this film never came to be but when he was forced to do a sequel to The Sheik, Son of the Sheik, he seen to it all stereotypes were done away with in this round.

Son of the Sheik is a wonderful movie that belongs to some fantasy world more than anything Arab. In this film the bad guys are expressly rogue Gypsy/French men, and their rogue because they want to be not because of their race (in fact the love interest is one of this tribe). The Sheiks (Valentino played both the son and father) in this film exhibit nothing stereotypical, and sans the prerequisite rape the Sheik is shown as a brave heroic man who learned from his mistake (the rape) to do good (rescue the girl). In fact father Sheik tells young Sheik its wrong to treat women in such a way.

Nothing makes me sicker or madder then when people are too lazy to watch a silent film lovingly placed on DVD which can easily be purchased via Amazon or Ebay for a reasonable price. Laziness has no place in journalism.