Cinematic Discoveries Resonating with the Themes of Divorce and the Daughter: Cult Guide

Dir: Frederick Sullivan

A convent-raised girl falls under her father's executor's dark influence after her uncle dies. As she turns to evil and threatens society with her wealth, a doctor helps restore her true nature.

Dir: Frederick Sullivan

After learning that his daughter Eleanor has been stricken blind, artist John Grayson dies of grief before he can complete his masterpiece, leaving her in their housekeeper's care. Artist Burton Lester rents Grayson's studio and a close friendship grows between him and Eleanor. Companionship ripens into love and when Burton learns that Eleanor's sight can be restored through an operation, he arranges for it. Upon recovering her sight, Eleanor learns that Burton has been married. Embittered by his deception, Eleanor leaves at once for New York where she finishes her father's masterpiece, winning renown as an artist. Meanwhile, Frank Hargreave, a young man with high morals, falls in love with her. When Hargreave's frivolous sister Vera loses her necklace while visiting a cabaret, she turns to Burton for help. Burton's reappearance forces Eleanor to confess all to Frank who then shuns her. Furious at both men, Eleanor is about to leave by train when she meets Vera with Burton. She stops to warn her of Burton's capriciousness in love, but learns that he is only trying to help Vera retrieve her necklace. A reconciliation is effected and all ends well as Eleanor and Burton announce their engagement.

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

Dir: Frederick Sullivan

When her husband Jim strikes it rich, Grace, who has had a lifelong fear of poverty, strictly raises her daughter Florence to accept only luxury. When Florence is old enough to have suitors, she quickly rejects penniless artist Durland and marries rich playboy Alfred Griffin, but soon learns that he is an unfaithful spendthrift, so they soon become bitter enemies. In a final effort to ruin Florence's life, Alfred neatly arranges evidence to make her look like his murderer, then commits suicide, but the butler saw everything and is able to clear Florence of this charge; afterward she rushes to Durland and they plan to get married.

Dir: Frederick Sullivan

Unable to agree on the man responsible for the plays commonly attributed to William Shakespeare, Miss Gray, who favors Francis Bacon, and Lieutenant Stanton, who accepts Shakespeare as the author, break off their engagement. Stanton then arranges to be transferred to the Mexican border, and while fighting there is badly wounded. When she hears the news about Stanton's condition, Miss Gray faints, and then dreams that she has been transported to Elizabethan times. Then, after Bacon falls in love with her, she discovers his obsessive jealousy of Shakespeare, and learns that he has bribed a courtier to accuse him of stealing Bacon's plays. As a result, when Miss Gray wakes up, she realizes that she has championed the wrong poet, and so she immediately is reconciled with Stanton, who soon recovers from his wound.

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

Dir: Frederick Sullivan

A fascinating piece of cinema that shares thematic elements.

Dir: Frederick Sullivan

A young girl is kept ignorant of her mother by her aunt. After her aunt dies, the girl is used by crooks and arrested. In prison she meets a kindly woman, who is married to a judge. The woman, unbeknownst to the girl, is her mother, and adopts her. The companion of the deceased aunt, in the midst of a ball, denounces the mother and reveals her secret to the judge and guests. The judge will not forgive his wife, so the mother and daughter leave and work among the slums to benefit humanity. Eventually, the judge relents, and seeks his wife for forgiveness, but he is too late.

A visual fragment from the archive: The thematic resonance of Master Shakespeare, Strolling Player perfectly mirrors the editorial trajectory of our deep dive.

Dir: Frederick Sullivan

A dramatization of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's poem 'The Courtship of Miles Standish,' this is the story of the Pilgrims who fled religious persecution in England and came to America aboard the Mayflower. John Alden, After numerous adventures at sea and with Indians on land, John Alden is asked by his friend Myles Standish to seek for him the romantic favor of his secret beloved, Priscilla Mullens. But Priscilla has eyes for another: John Alden.

Dir: Frederick Sullivan

The many rejected suitors of Mary Brown form the "Broken Heart Club" and console each other in their misery. The last member decides that Mary needs a lesson and proceeds to give her one. He gets a fashion dummy and on his porch the rejected ones pay "Miss Hope" all sorts of attention. Mary falls for the ruse and starts an investigation. She doesn't find out who the guest is until she has promised to marry the man who had the brains to think up the trick.

A visual fragment from the archive: The thematic resonance of Oh, Doctor, Doctor! perfectly mirrors the editorial trajectory of our deep dive.

Dir: Frederick Sullivan

Bob, John, and Edward--three young boys growing up in the same neighborhood--have vastly-different experiences with sex. Bob's father patiently explains "the birds and the bees" to him, and even takes him to a hospital to see the effects of venereal disease. John's and Edward's parents don't tell them anything, leaving the boys to find out "on the streets". Consequently, when they become adults, John--who's been "playing the field"--contracts syphilis and is stopped from marrying and infecting his sweetheart. Edward, on the other hand, has become addicted to "self-love" and masturbates himself into an insane asylum. Wholesome Bob marries and, naturally, lives happily ever after.

Dir: Frederick Sullivan

Margery Carew and her widowed sister, Anna Prentice, find work in a brokerage firm, James Gray, the junior partner, soon falls in love with Margery, while his boss, William Cleves, does his best to seduce Anna. In fighting off William's advances, Anna kills him, but Margery, hoping to protect Anna's child, takes the blame and then escapes to the West, after which she gets married and begins a new life. Following a lengthy search, the police manage to track her down, but Margery still refuses to save herself by telling the truth about the murder, even though Anna and her child died several years before in a car crash. Finally, however, because he still loves her and because he has been stricken by a deadly disease that will kill him in a few months, James confesses to the murder, thereby freeing Margery to return to her husband.