Hand-Picked Alternatives Movies That Echo the Spirit of Carmen of t...

Dir: Reginald Barker

An American sailor falls in love with a fisherman's daughter and convinces her that Jesus is more powerful than the gods who have cursed her.

Dir: Reginald Barker

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

Christ takes on the form of a pacifist count to end a senseless war.

Dir: Reginald Barker

A parson, in love with a girl who is betrothed to a rich Count in her family's hope of partaking in the Count's fortune, uses his pulpit in a scheme to shame the family into allowing the girl to break the engagement and marry him instead.

Dir: Reginald Barker

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

The bandit Jim Stokes, wanting to go straight and settle down with his new bride, strikes a bargain with the sheriff for his freedom.

Dir: Reginald Barker

In war-torn Europe, Colonel Damien seizes an enemy town, then to persuade the defeated soldiers to give up their ill-gotten money, the Emir of Balkania, commander of the supporting native troops, threatens to unleash his men on the women who are staying in the town abbey. After giving the captured men a payment deadline, Damien collapses in a chair and falls asleep. As he sleeps, the emir goes to the abbey where Sylvia, the colonel's daughter, is staying in secret. He offers to free the other women in exchange for her sexual favors, but after complying with his demands, she shoots and kills him. When Damien discovers the emir's corpse, he orders the assassin shot, and covered in a veil, Sylvia is promptly executed. After her body is identified, the colonel is overcome with grief. Finally, he wakes up in his armchair and, realizing the tragedy was only a dream, orders his troops to leave the town in peace.

Dir: Reginald Barker

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

A young Italian immigrant girl, uneducated and superstitious, finds an abandoned baby on the stairs of her tenement, with a note attached explaining the baby is illegitimate. A young newspaper reporter, whom the girl knows from waiting on him at the restaurant where she works, reads the note for her. But the police arrest her, at no evidence whatsoever other than possession of the baby, for kidnapping. She refuses to tell them the baby was abandoned and fatherless, because she was herself, and confesses, in order to save the baby from being branded a bastard, that she stole it. The reporter goes to the jail and elicits the truth from her. And then proposes to her and adopts the baby.

Dir: Reginald Barker

"Honest Jim" Martin is elected by popular vote to the U.S. Senate in the fight against the Railway Land-Grab Bill. When Jim goes to Washington his mother accompanies him. At the first reception of the season, Jim is introduced to Harriet Lane, the most dangerous woman in the Capital, by Wm. Landers, chief of the secret railway lobby. Harriet is a lobbyist and is supposed to win the votes of the senators for the Land-Grab Bill. Jim becomes fascinated by Harriet's wit and beauty and she and Landers set a snare for him. Harriet writes him that she is in great trouble and asks him to call at her hotel. In his sympathy for her he places his arm about her and she leans against him, burying her face against his shoulders. As she does this she manages to loosen her hair, which falls in a tangled mass over her shoulders. She also disarranged her waist, giving evidence of a struggle having taken place between herself and Jim. While they are in this position Landers snaps their picture from a curtained doorway where he is concealed. He then confronts Jim and tells him that the negative will be given the newspapers if Jim doesn't give them his vote. Jim leaves the hotel in no pleasant frame of mind, first telling Harriet of his scorn for her. Harriet, who has become friendly with Jim's mother, is very unhappy because of the part she has been obliged to play and when Mother Martin calls on her that afternoon, bringing her a pie which she has baked herself for Harriet's birthday, Harriet determines to get the negatives from Landers and destroy them. To do this, she goes to Lander's office that night and unable to open the safe, because Landers has anticipated some such move on her part and changed the combination, she telephones to police headquarters and asks them to send up an expert to open the safe. This is done and while Harriet and the expert are still in the office (Harriet with the negatives in her hand) Landers enters and snatches the negatives from her. He has drawn his pistol and as he stands there talking with the safe expert, Harriet snatches the pistol from his hand and shoots the negatives to pieces as they lay on Lander's desk. The next day she sends them to Jim with a note telling him that all the evidence the lobby had against him is enclosed and asking him in future to try to live up to his mother's belief in him.

Dir: Reginald Barker

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

The Devil, in the guise of a human, meets a young couple who remark upon looking at a Renaissance painting of a martyr that Evil could never triumph over Good. The Devil, taking this as a challenge, decides to bring about the couple's downfall.

Dir: Reginald Barker

A stagecoach robber falls in love with a saloon girl. However, she falls for a pastor, who converts her; she marries him. The robber is so impressed by this that he decides to turn over a new leaf. However, a shady gambler sets his sights on the former saloon girl, and the robber has to protect her from his advances.

Dir: Reginald Barker

After his wife dies in childbirth, mountaineer Jim Grimsby names his newborn daughter Bill, and raises her as a boy. Remaining a boy in name only, however, Bill soon wants to style her hair and wear the latest fashions. She soon develops a crush on the new sheriff, Waldo Whittier. Appalled at the prospect of his "son" marrying Waldo, Jim decides to test the sheriff's grit, and so, believing that Waldo will be too frightened to come after him, he robs a casino. The sheriff does pursue, however, and, further impressing Jim, Bill pulls a rifle on Waldo to protect her father. Now certain of the sheriff's manliness, and convinced that his daughter has not forgotten how to act like a man, Jim returns the casino's money and agrees to let Bill and Waldo continue their courtship.