Curated Recommendations Similar Cinematic Experiences to A Beggar in Purple: Cult Guide

Dir: Edgar Lewis

The picture opens in Pennsylvania 25 years ago, during the winter of terrible drought. Vogel, the village's most prosperous farmer, is called to his only brother's bedside to take charge of his 4-year-old nephew George. On his way home from the suicide's house, Vogel finds an old gypsy woman carrying an infant almost frozen to death. Vogel takes the infant home with him and the next day adopts her with George. The old gypsy is paid a sum of money to give up all claim of the child on condition that she will not interfere in the future. She accepts and departs. Marika and George are known in the town as the calamity children. Three years later, a daughter, Gertrude, is born to Vogel. The family is returning from her christening when the old gypsy woman suddenly seizes Marika and caresses her. The crowd drives off the old woman, the the incident makes an impression on Marika's young mind. Marika and George become childhood sweethearts, and when George is 12, he and Marika plant a little tree in the garden behind the house and call it their sweetheart tree. Seeing this, Vogel chides George for being so sentimentally silly, and orders him to get to work filling the grain bins. George resents Vogel's manner, and Vogel angrily flings out that George's father was a suicide who left Vogelto pay all his debts and bring up his son. George runs away, vowing that he will not return to the village until he can repay Vogel in full. Years pass and Marika and Gertrude are grown to young womanhood. Marika, with the memory of George ever in her heart, learns that he has prospered and is about to return to the village. Vogel, who hears this news, decides that George is the man to marry his daughter Gertrude. George returns, and is hailed with delight by all except Marika, who, actuated by a motive of gratitude because of all Vogel has done for her in the past, stifles the call of her own heart and keeps her love for George locked within her own breast. Later George asks Marika why she avoids him, but she's evasive, and he, in a fit of pique, proposes to Gertrude. When she hears of this, Marika insists upon fitting up the new home which George and his future bride are to occupy in a neighboring village. This necessitates her making frequent trips at night, returning to her home the following day. On one of these trips Marika again meets the old gypsy woman, who seizes her and calls her her daughter. Marika rushes to her home and later, as she hears the family discussing the incident of meeting the gypsy years ago, she realizes for the first time that the old hag is her own mother. It is St. John's Eve, two days before the wedding of George and Gertrude, and Marika is to make her last trip to the couple's new home. The family have retired and George has remained up to keep Marika company until train time. As she realizes that George is soon to go out of her life forever, Marika is unable to restrain the pent-up passion of years, and she begs George to take her in his arms. This action is seen through the window by the old gypsy, who realizes that from now on she can secure money from George to keep the facts of what took place from the public. As the day dawns George begs Marika to let him go to Vogel and tell his love for her, but she, knowing that the shock would kill Gertrude and break her foster parents' hearts, refuses. Later she silently looks on with breaking heart as George and Gertrude are married. During the wedding ceremony the old gypsy enters Vogel's house and is found by the returning guests in the cellar, intoxicated. She is arrested and taken to jail. Marika learns of this and goes at once to her mother, and finds her very ill. She dies in delirium. The next morning Pastor Hoffman, who has always loved Marika, comes to the cell and finds his beloved bending over the body of her mother. He takes her into his arms and she leaves the prison with him.

Dir: Edgar Lewis

Stephen Orry is an Icelandic vagabond. Rachel, the daughter of the governor of the province, is attracted to him. Her father, who is against the relationship, drives her from home, and she marries Orry. But she cannot make a man out of Orry, who runs off to sea. Rachel supports herself and her son Jason, while Orry begins a new life on the Isle of Man. He marries Liza Killey and they have a son named Sunlocks. When Liza mistreats Sunlocks, Orry takes him away to the governor of the Isle for safekeeping. After Rachel dies, Jason sets out for revenge against his father. His half-brother Sunlocks sets out for Iceland to find Rachel and Jason to make reparations, while Jason comes to the Isle of Man. While there, Jason saves his father from drowning, and after his father dies from a natural death, he turns his desire for revenge against Sunlocks. But when Sunlocks becomes a political prisoner, Jason forgoes his revenge and dies in place of Sunlocks.

A visual fragment from the archive: The thematic resonance of The Bondman perfectly mirrors the editorial trajectory of our deep dive.

Dir: Edgar Lewis

Karl "Curly" Casterline, a wrongfully discharged New York City policeman, finds work on the Midwestern farm of Adolf Bauerle to help the war effort. Curly is attracted to his boss's niece, Mina, but also realizes that Adolf and his cohort, Kurz, plan to blow up a troop train. Curly kills the two saboteurs and saves the train, but he is jailed by the abusive Sheriff Herman Lindig. Although Mina praises Curly for saving the soldiers' lives, he is sentenced to death and is denied a pardon from the governor. After the case attracts national attention, the governor explains that he prolonged Curly's incarceration to draw attention to the danger of German propaganda. Curly marries Mina and is later pardoned by the governor, who enlists him as an officer to protect the state from its enemies. Sheriff Lindig and his German conspirators are convicted and escorted to federal prison by Curly.

Dir: Edgar Lewis

The scene is set in the Pennsylvania petroleum region. Oil worker William Brett has used his scanty hoard of savings to send his daughter Jane to the city to secure a higher education. Completing her course as a trained nurse, Jane visits her old home. Amid the settlement's corroding influence, her brother becomes a thief. Jane's sister Annie falls a prey to the blandishments of a tempter from the city. Fired with indignation against the injustice of affairs, Jane devotes herself to the double mission of avenging and of righting the wrongs of which her family and the community in general have been subjected. Her father is seriously hurt in an accident at work, and his pay is stopped. Jane hastens to the city, determined to make an effort to awaken William Jameson, the millionaire owner of the oil field, to a realization of the wrongs imposed upon the workers. She arrives at a time when the millionaire's son John Jameson, who glimpsed the light of uplift, is vainly pleading with his father to listen to his plans for the betterment of the workers' conditions. Jane is compelled to force her way into the Jameson mansion during the progress of a bal masque given in aid of the Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. She accosts William Jameson in his study, and wild with anger and further maddened by the millionaire's gibes, she tries to kill him and is arrested by detectives. Although she and young Jameson have not met, the latter is instrumental in obtaining her release. Jane goes back to the workers and a secret strike is formed, Jane being the ring-leader. They determine to fire the wells to teach Jameson a lesson. It is at this time that John Jameson comes to the oil wells to investigate conditions. His identity is not known by anyone except the superintendent. Morgan, the ringleader of the workers, is in love with Jane, and on the eve of the firing of the wells he learns of Jameson's identity by breaking into his cottage. The same evening, to save the property, young Jameson goes to Jane, confesses his identity, and pleads with her to help him save the property. Jane is in a quandary. She has fallen in love with the man, whom she believed to be a workman, and he with her. Finally, when she goes to the meeting place of the strikers and pleads with them to hold off, Morgan, who has just broken into Jameson's hut, rushes in, and accuses her of being a traitor. There is a fight. They trample over Jane and rush to the wells. Jane, realizing that they will turn to her unsuspecting lover and try to kill him, drags herself to him and just in time throws herself in front of him as the strikers rush to kill him. However, John Jameson bares himself to the strikers, asks them to listen to him, and proves to them that he is there on their behalf. He then goes to his father and forces him to give in to the strikers, and all ends happily.

A visual fragment from the archive: The thematic resonance of Love and the Law perfectly mirrors the editorial trajectory of our deep dive.

Dir: Bruno Ziener

A fascinating piece of cinema that shares thematic elements.

Dir: Edgar Lewis

Herbert Carey discharges the Dudley brothers, Joe and Jim, from their positions as overseers on his plantation and thereby incurs their enmity. War is declared and Carey, after bidding his wife and daughter Virgie farewell, joins the Southern forces, the Dudleys joining the Northern. The spring of '61 finds Carey the most dangerous and daring of Confederate scouts. The Dudleys are under the command of Colonel Morrison, a dashing, chivalrous young Northern officer. Grant closes in on Richmond and orders Morrison to capture Carey. Morrison takes a small detachment of troops, including Jim Dudley, and going to the Carey homestead, searches it. Dudley, seeing a chance for revenge, sets fire to the house, but in endeavoring to escape is shot and killed by Morrison, who has discovered his treachery. Penniless and with the house in ruins, Mrs. Carey and Virgie finally seek shelter in their former overseers' deserted cabin. Mrs. Carey sinks down and finally dies. Carey, hearing of this, gets to the cottage and assists Uncle Billy to bury her. Carey, wishing to remove Virgie to Richmond, receives a pass from Lee permitting Virgie and an escort to go through the Confederate lines. As he goes to the cottage to deliver the pass to Uncle Billy he is discovered and captured in it by Morrison. Carey tells him why he had come and Morrison's heart, being touched, he also gives Carey a pass through the Northern lines, telling him to take Virgie into Richmond himself. Joe Dudley discovers this and informs the Northern officer that Morrison has given a pass to Carey, the notorious scout, to pass through the Northern lines. Carey and Morrison are captured, court-martialed and sentenced to be shot. Little Virgie, hearing of this, goes to Grant and pleads with him to save her "Daddy." Carey is called before Grant and tells his story. Grant's heart is touched and he releases Carey telling him that though he cannot honor Morrison's pass, he can honor that of General Lee. Morrison is released also, and Carey and The Littlest Rebel. Virgie, are once more reunited. After the war finds Morrison, his wife and child, meeting Carey and Virgie over his wife's grave; the North and South join hands. The Confederate flag is seen meeting the Stars and Stripes; they flutter for a moment, then slowly intertwine and the picture fades away.

A visual fragment from the archive: The thematic resonance of The Toilers perfectly mirrors the editorial trajectory of our deep dive.

Dir: Alexander Butler

In Alberta, Canada, a Cornish emigrant unmasks a rustler posing as the girl's "blind" father.

Dir: Edgar Lewis

A barrier stands between Lt. Meade Burrell and Necia, the woman he loves. That barrier is the fact that she's a "half-breed"--half-Indian and half-white, with an Indian mother and John Gale, a white trader, for a father. Although he has proposed marriage to Necia, she releases him from it when she realizes the damage that marrying a half-breed would do to him personally and professionally. One day a man arrives in town with information that could solve everyone's problems.

A visual fragment from the archive: The thematic resonance of Eva, wo bist du? perfectly mirrors the editorial trajectory of our deep dive.

Dir: Edgar Lewis

Bill Matthews and his partner, owners of the "Croix D'or mine, are beset on all sides dues to the schemes of a trusted colleague who plots to take their mine away from them, and leaves no under-handed method un-attempted in the process.

Dir: Edgar Lewis

Montana cattleman Austin Brandt is jilted by Rosemary, who elopes with stranger Royce Greer, but he is consoled by his 20-year-old niece Joan. Rosemary later returns to Custer City to run a dance hall with her husband, who mistreats her. Eastern capitalist Robert Barton comes to town with his son Ford to settle a financial misunderstanding with Brandt. After reprimanding his son, Robert Barton is later found dead in his bed. Knowing of their financial argument, Ford believes Brandt is responsible, while Greer and his gang claim that Ford committed the murder. Convinced of his innocence, Ford asks Brandt to help him find the murderer. They discover that Barton was shot with a .38 caliber bullet, and Greer carries such a revolver. Meanwhile Greer's mob storms Brandt's house demanding Ford be taken prisoner. Brandt forces a confession from Greer, who is dragged away. After her husband's death, Rosemary departs and leaves a note explaining her love for Brandt. Joan and Ford find happiness together.