Must-Watch List in the Vein of The Devil-Doll: Cult Guide

Dir: Tod Browning

Stella Schump is a shop girl and very devoted to her mother, who desires her to marry. Stella befriends her shoe store co-worker Cora Kinealy, who invites Stella to a party to meet the hero of a munitions plant fire. The young man does not attend, and Stella is pressured into over-drinking. She wanders into the street, is picked up by a detective, taken to night court, and sentenced to ten days in jail. Stella writes to her mother, and the shock of the news causes her mother's death. Upon release, Stella is relieved of her job and without a home. While wandering the streets, she is picked up by a man and taken to a Salvation Army home. The man is John Gilley, the munitions plant hero. The two find happiness together.

Dir: Edward LeSaint

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

When famous opera singer Elinore Duane undergoes an operation on her throat, she has a series of ether-induced visions. In one, she is transported to ancient Rome where she appears as a much-admired woman in love with Paul, a young heretic, and at odds with Lutor, the high priest. To save her love, she poisons Lutor with her ring. After several other visions which involve variations on this love triangle, Elinore awakens to discover that Lutor is actually her doctor, Sascha Jaccard, and that Paul is the son of a friend who has come to visit the recovering prima donna.

Dir: Tod Browning

Jim Bludso is engineer of the Mississippi River packet the "Prairie Belle." He has a home in Gilgal, Ill., and a wife and twelve-month-old baby at the time the story opens, in 1861. A call is received for volunteers and he joins the Northern army. His wife is a Southern girl, and she opposes his joining the Union forces. The quarrel results in a separation and Jim goes to war. Ben Merrill, an unscrupulous contractor, meets Jim's wife in Natchez, her home town, and induces her to go with him to New Orleans. She deserts her baby and goes. In New Orleans a levee contractor comes to Merrill with the proposition that they take the contract for a new levee to be built at Gilgal. Merrill accepts and leaves New Orleans without telling the woman where he is going, and she is left to take care of herself. After the war Jim returns to Natchez and finds that his wife has deserted their little boy, and no one knows where she is. He takes the boy, Little Breeches, and Banty Tim, a negro, who has saved his life during the war, and returns to Gilgal. He is welcomed by Kate Taggart, the daughter of the village storekeeper. Jim's wife yearns for her baby and returns. Jim forgives her for the child's sake. The high waters are coming on and Merrill is afraid that the levee will not hold. He plans to lay the blame on Jim and the negro. He arouses the suspicion of the townspeople against the negro and Jim is forced to fight for Banty Tim on several occasions. Merrill meets Jim's wife and induces her to loosen the sandbags and leave the water into the village. She escapes in a boat, the bottom of which has been cut by Merrill. In the middle of the stream the boat begins to sink and Banty Tim goes to her rescue. The negro is accused of breaking the levee and then escaping. Jim offers his life as a forfeit if the negro does not return by sunrise. The next day the village people are at Indian Mound, and the men are about to hang Jim because Banty Tim has not come back. Just then he comes on with Little Breeches, who tells of his rescue by the negro. A year later Jim is again engineer of the "Prairie Belle." In a race with another boat the engines become overheated. Merrill is aboard and Jim has him locked in the oil room. When the boat takes fire Jim goes and opens the door of the oil room and finds his son there with Merrill. While they are trying to escape the boilers explode. Jim is rescued from the debris by Banty Tim. Some time later Jim's wife having died, he and Little Breeches and Kate and Banty Tim are united in a happy family.

Dir: Bruno Ziener

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

A fascinating piece of cinema that shares thematic elements.

Dir: Tod Browning

Jacala, a strong-willed, temperamental ranch girl, inherits her father's millions and moves from Montana to New York, determined to earn a place in society. There she meets and is strongly attracted to Kenneth Hyde, but believing him to be a worthless man-about-town with a neglected wife, she hires Tony Dewey to pose as her fiancé. Tony wants a wealthy wife, and when his attentions toward Jacala are sternly rebuffed, he spreads scandalous stories about her. Jacala learns that Kenneth's supposed wife is actually his sister, and he, in turn, believes her claims that Tony's stories are untrue. With Kenneth, Jacala retreats from the superficial society life she had once coveted.

Dir: Tod Browning

A visual fragment from the archive: The thematic resonance of Eva, wo bist du? perfectly mirrors the editorial trajectory of our deep dive.

Princess Marya and her brother, the Grand Duke Paul of Russia, are studying in the U.S. when word reaches them that Rasputin is to be killed. Paul is seized by Russian secret service men, but through Marya's appeal to Captain Rodney Willard, he is released. In Russia, Marya participates actively in the Revolution, while Willard, with whom she has fallen in love, joins the Allied Commission. Deeply troubled by the influence of German agents in Russia, Marya organizes the Legion of Death, a fighting unit of peasant women, and leads them into battle against the Germans. The legion suffers defeat and Marya is captured, but in the end, she wins her freedom.

Dir: Alexander Butler

In Alberta, Canada, a Cornish emigrant unmasks a rustler posing as the girl's "blind" father.

Dir: Tod Browning

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

A slum girl is forced to steal for a living. After she swipes a rich society's matron's necklace, she hides out at the home of a man who turns out to be the socialite's former fiance.

Dir: Tod Browning

Carma Carmichael, who lives with her uncle Quincy, is kidnapped by her renegade father Roger and taken to his ancestral Southern home. Uncle Quincy sends young Jack Carrington to investigate and goes into hiding, leading the Carmichaels to believe he is dead. Carma is at first suspicious of Jack's intentions but soon learns that the man who abducted her is actually an impostor who murdered her father and now lives in the plantation with a group of thugs. Despite "Roger's" attempts to take Jack's life, the young man incites the thugs against him and they attack the house. Uncle Quincy arrives with a posse, and after their rescue, Carma and Jack embrace.

Dir: Tod Browning

Easterner Alva Leigh arrives in the mining town of Magnet just after her fiancé, Donald Jaffray, has been murdered. Because Alva has sworn vengeance, "Sudden" Duncan, the real murderer, accuses Donald's partner, Dick Randall, of the crime. Knowing that Dick is planning a journey across the desert, Duncan fills his canteen with poison, but Alva, who also is determined to kill Dick, drills a hole in the canteen so that the water will drain out. After Dick's departure, Alva learns from "Tiger Lil'," who is jealous of Duncan's attention to the Eastern newcomer, that it was Duncan who killed Donald. Frantic, Alva immediately mounts a horse and rides into the desert to save the man she now recognizes as her true love. Tiger Lil' shoots Duncan in a dance hall quarrel, and Alva marries Dick.