Hidden Genre Gems In Alignment with the style of Condottieri: Cult ...

Dir: Maurice Elvey

A Royalist and his unknown son seek vengeance on his murdered wife's brothers.

Dir: Charles Swickard

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

A young Egyptian goes to the rescue of his employers, a wealthy European family, when they are menaced by a local strongman and his gang.

Dir: J. Gordon Edwards

Don Caesar de Bazan, a reckless nobleman, falls for Maritana, a gypsy dancing girl. When Maritana is insulted by a drunk, Don Caesar wins her love by coming to her rescue. The two go to Madrid, where the girl is summoned to dance before the Queen. Maritana also attracts the attention of King Charles. Don Jose, the prime minister, who secretly loves the Queen, plots to get Maritana for the King. To do this, he schemes to have Maritana marry a nobleman so she can enter the King's court. Don Jose chooses Don Caesar, who has been imprisoned and sentenced to death for dueling during Holy Week. Don Caesar agrees to marry the woman selected by Don Jose. After the ceremony, his wife believes he has been pardoned, but Don Caesar is sent to a firing squad. He is saved by a youth who has removed the bullets from the rifles. Eventually, Don Caesar wins the King's approval, and he is made prime minister.

Dir: William F. Adler

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

A travelogue/documentary including explorations of the fauna and people of Siam, New Guinea, and Java, with interpolations of an apparently fictitious encounter between the filmmakers and cannibalistic natives of Frederick Henry Island in the South Pacific.

Dir: Maurice Tourneur

Having endangered his life by foolishly gambling away funds entrusted to him by the Carbonari, an Italian secret society, London banker Bernard Huddlestone appeals to Northmour, an adventurer, for protection. Northmour takes Huddlestone and his daughter Clara to his castle in Scotland, offering them safety in return for Clara's hand in marriage. There Clara encounters Frank Cassilis, an old adversary of Northmour's, and falls in love. Trouble brews between the two men, but when the Carbonari discovers Huddlestone's hiding place and storms the castle, the fugitives band together to fight the avengers. Coming to the realization that only his sacrifice will appease the attackers, Huddlestone steps out and meets his death. Northmour, deciding that married life would prove too monotonous, gives up his claim on Clara to Cassilis.

Dir: Antoni Bednarczyk

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

The north-eastern Polish province of Vilnius is after WW1 plundered by savage Bolsheviks. The heroic Polish army is bound to stop them.

Dir: Aubrey M. Kennedy

Wealthy oil magnate Harry Mangin is in love with his competitor James Murdock's daughter Blanche. Mangin schemes to ruin Blanche's father so that the girl will be forced to accept his attention. However, Blanche loves "Sky Eye" Blake, an aviator at the adjoining U. S. aviation field. When Mangin is driven in desperation to muster his own private air force in order to destroy his rival's oil plants, "Sky Eye" takes to the skies to quell the riot. After several daring escapades, "Sky Eye" captures Mangin and wins Blanche for his bride.

Dir: Francis J. Grandon

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

A raft carrying a little girl and a dead woman drifts in from a shipwreck to Devil's Island. There, a band of thieves and smugglers name the girl Rose Marie, though she grows up as "nobody's girl." Living in a cave, she learns to read through the kindness of Jason, who is soon killed by the cruel leader, Red Gull. In Red Gull's power, and urged on by Jason's jealous wife, Rose Marie makes her escape in a rowboat, where she is spotted by an aviator flying above the sea. He rescues her, taking her to be cared for at his home where she is well treated. When newspapers report a mysterious shipwreck on Devil's Island, Rose Marie reveals the way in which Red Gull lured ships to their doom there. She guides the authorities to the island, where, after a fierce battle, the thieves are wiped out. Eventually the aviator falls in love with Rose Marie, and "nobody's girl" is somebody's sweetheart at last.

Dir: Donald Crisp

During the Civil War, young widow Rachel Hayne is among those "held by the enemy" when her old family home is within the lines occupied by the Northern troops. Protected by Colonel Prescott from looters and the unwelcome attentions of Surgeon Fielding, Rachel begins to fall in love with the gallant Yankee officer. Their romance is disrupted when Rachel's husband Gordon, long reported dead, is captured as a spy and condemned to death. When Gordon is wounded during an attempted escape, Rachel's loyalty impels her to try to save him by feigning his death. As Gordon's stretcher is carried through the hospital, Fielding demands an examination of the body, charging that Prescott is involved in a plot to smuggle the spy out of the hospital alive. General Stanton lifts the cover from the body, only to find that death has really come, freeing both Rachel and Prescott.

Dir: Victor Heerman

In the gold fields of the Canadian Northwest, a man is falsely accused of a crime and determines that a lookalike is responsible.