The Definitive Watchlist For Devotees of Little Speck in Garnered Fruit: Cult Guide

Dir: Martin Justice

Maida and Grace of the Busy Bee Department Store, are chums, but rivals for the hand of Mr. Ramsey, head clerk at the store. They both consider him extremely eligible and a good catch, for he is about to be taken into partnership. Old Bachman, the proprietor, always gives a Thanksgiving dinner to his employees, and for this particular occasion, Maida has managed to buy the material for a purple dress. She tells Schlegel the tailor that she will pay a balance owing of four dollars the night before Thanksgiving. Her friend Grace had spent her room rent on a new dress to attend the Thanksgiving dinner, and so Grace will not be thrown out of her room, generous Maida advances to her the small sum she had put aside as the final payment on her purple dress. After the dinner she leaves and goes to the tailor, and to her surprise he gives her the dress. She discards her old one and starts forth with the new purple beauty. On the way she meets Mr. Ramsey, and she makes such an impression on him that he decides that now is the time to get married.

Dir: Martin Justice

Towers Chandler saves a little out of his weekly pay from an architect's office and uses it to have a night on the town every few weeks. On one outing he meets a shop girl. When he boasts of his yachts and polo ponies she disdains his lack of a worthy purpose in life. The shop girl, though, is in reality the daughter of a tycoon. Her father decides to build a country house and employs the firm where Towers works. He brings the architectural plans to the tycoon's house and when the girl sees him meaningfully employed she realizes his does have a purpose in life.

A visual fragment from the archive: The thematic resonance of Lost on Dress Parade perfectly mirrors the editorial trajectory of our deep dive.

Dir: Martin Justice

This story revolves around a young woman who loses her job and a young man who has been unable to make a success as an art photographer. A fire breaks out in the house where the woman is rooming, and she rushes to the street en dishabille, just as the man appears. Immediately he has visions of a fortune, and persuades her to pose as a wild Greek girl. He has her arrested for performing Grecian dances in the street in her scanty attire. After she is freed, she causes a sensation in a restaurant, and by the next day is headlined in all the newspapers, with the result that the bright young man succeeds in securing a contract for his "star" at a big salary.

Dir: Martin Justice

An elderly toy shop proprietor takes in a little girl from the street one night and before she enjoys some holiday food she dreams of marching marionettes.

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

Dir: Martin Justice

John Lorison, self-exiled to New Orleans, meets Norah Greenway in a cheap restaurant. They soon become friends, but each night, Norah inexplicably leaves John at 8 o'clock at the same corner. One night, Lorison realizes that he is no longer willing to be left on the corner of life alone and, dreading her reaction, he tells Norah that he loves her but that his past is marred by a charge of theft and that he dare not ask an untarnished woman to marry him. Norah eases his mind by disclosing that the crime of theft also lurks in her past. The night of their marriage at Father Rogan's house, Norah asks Lorison to leave her at the corner for one last time. His suspicions aroused, Lorison interrogates the priest who takes him to Norah's home where the new husband is confronted with a little child who tells him that the girl has promised that this is the last night she is going to stay out. These circumstances lead Lorison to believe that his wife is a street walker until the priest takes him to the dressmaking shop in which Norah has been laboring day and night in order to earn enough money so that she might brighten the life of her little brother. Father Rogan then explains that Norah had told a beautiful, desperate lie.

Dir: Martin Justice

A fascinating piece of cinema that shares thematic elements.

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

Dir: Martin Justice

Sanford, a soap manufacturer who earned his fortune through advertising, decides to help his daughter Marjorie break into society by launching a campaign to publicize her. When he sends the snobbish Mrs. Van Ruhl a check for her pet charity, the society matron invites Marjorie to attend a charity bazaar, and young Richard Van Ruhl promptly falls in love with the girl. Next, however, Sanford announces his newest product with magazine ads that feature Marjorie using the soap in her bathtub. This is too much for Mrs. Van Ruhl, who contemptuously labels Marjorie the "soap girl" and orders Richard to stop courting her. In retaliation, Marjorie buys a whiskey distillery and, having learned that the first Van Ruhls in America sold rum to the Indians, prints a likeness of Mrs. Van Ruhl on the label of each bottle. Fearing her own social demise, Mrs. Van Ruhl quickly makes peace with the Sanfords, and Richard and Marjorie are allowed to marry.

Dir: Martin Justice

Nevada Warren is a poor girl who can neither read nor write and suddenly finds herself surrounded by luxury. Nevada's father dies, and she is sent to live with his wealthy brother in New York. Her cousin, Barbara, soon becomes jealous of the attentions that Gilbert Ross, an artist, is paying her, and when he sends Nevada a note about some flowers, Barbara tells her it is a request for her to come to Gilbert's studio at midnight. Nevada goes, thinking Gilbert is ill. He is surprised to see her, but as he really loves her, and learns of Barbara's deception, proposes an immediate elopement, to which Nevada agrees with alacrity. She confesses to Gilbert that she cannot read or write, but he says that can easily be remedied, and that the note about the flowers proved to be the best letter he ever wrote.

A visual fragment from the archive: The thematic resonance of Blind Man's Holiday perfectly mirrors the editorial trajectory of our deep dive.

Dir: Martin Justice

Margaret Seldon's father, who has been victimized by three business associates and sent to prison, calls his daughter to him in his dying moments and asks her to avenge him. Through a detective agency she locates Amos Colby and Courtland Wells; and learning that the third man is dead, she adds his son, Allan Forbes, to the list. She foils Colby's attempt to ruin two financiers by gaining a position aboard his yacht. Disguised as a Spanish dancer, she appears at a reception given by Wells's fiancée, traps him into making love to her, and then exposes him. But she meets Forbes, Greenwich Village architect, and falls in love with him before learning his identity; stifling her feelings, she leaves him, but finding no satisfaction in pursuing her revenge, she returns.