Top-Tier Alternatives In the Shadow of Made in Heaven: Cult Guide

Dir: Victor Schertzinger

A young woman works in the scullery of a grand hotel, and dreams of a life among its fashionable patrons.

Dir: Victor Schertzinger

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

James Ashe sends his son James Jr. off to manage a family-owned logging mill. While attending to his duties, James Jr. falls in love with a beautiful girl.

Dir: Victor Schertzinger

The mind of theology student Webster Smith becomes unbalanced from strain. Traveling across the desert as God's savior, he arrives weakened at Red Butte, a small mining town. Faro Fan, who runs a saloon and gambling joint cleanly, and who cares for the town's homeless children, helps Smith, but when he learns her business, he curses her. While Smith builds a church, Faro nurses renegade Spanish Ed, who spreads a fever to her wards. After Smith prays for fire to purge the town, excepting his church, saloon keeper Delicate Hanson, trying to disinfect his bar by burning whiskey on it, starts a fire which quickly spreads to the church, while leaving Faro's house unscathed. Furious, Smith attacks Faro. When she hits his head with a club, his sanity returns, and he helps her nurse the children. After Smith leaves to get supplies, Spanish Ed, crazed with thirst, tries to attract Faro. When Smith returns, Faro shoots him, thinking he is Spanish Ed. As she nurses him to health, they fall in love.

Dir: Victor Schertzinger

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

Ezra Hollins, though a hired man, is ambitious because he loves Ruth Endicott, his employer's daughter. Ruth, not knowing of his love, helps him with his studies, though secretly, because she knows her father would not approve. Ezra passes his entrance examination, but at the last moment gives his tuition money to save the brother of the girl he loves from the results of his speculations from the bank. His failure to go to college is misunderstood, but in the end his name is cleared and Caleb is proud of his chosen son-in-law.

Dir: Victor Schertzinger

David Clary runs a sleepy little dry-goods store in a sleepy little town. A vamp from the big city shows up, intent on taking Clary for everything he's worth by a combination of seduction and blackmail. But the day is saved by the ingenuity of David's corset model.

Dir: Victor Schertzinger

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

A young man with little ambition is given an opportunity to set himself up in business by means of financial support from his father. But the young man becomes involved in a shady railroad deal which threatens to destroy his own father.

Dir: Victor Schertzinger

Everett Nelson was born on a farm and is an only son. He does all the hard work on the place for his father, who keeps the country bank. Unable to stand the bondage any longer, Everett leaves for New York in quest of work. While job hunting he sees a sign on the door requesting the services of a janitor. On entering to apply for the position he finds himself on the stage of a theater, where a rehearsal for a musical comedy is in progress. The astounded manager gazes at this apparition, and then an idea strikes him. He hires the "Clodhopper" for a rural number in his show. How the "Rube" makes the hit of his life as well as showing he is not to be laughed at as a prodigal son is shown in the events that follow.

Dir: Victor Schertzinger

A visual fragment from the archive: The thematic resonance of A Nine O'Clock Town perfectly mirrors the editorial trajectory of our deep dive.

Sheriff's son Royal Beaudry is thought a coward, even by the young woman he has his heart set on. But he disproves cowardice when he rescues his father's friend from kidnappers.

Dir: Victor Schertzinger

Wealthy young Billy Bates's greatest fear is that he has inherited his family curse: drink. But when he falls for a beautiful showgirl from the Ziegfeld Follies, she shows him he has nothing to fear.

Dir: Victor Schertzinger

Wealthy young man Steven du Peyster encounters more adventures than he might have expected when he accepts a wager that he can live successfully on six dollars a week.