Underground Favorites Parallel to the Artistry of The Devil's Riddle: Cult Guide

Dir: Frank Beal

Eleanor Burton, a hotel telephone operator, breaks her engagement to Frederick Lawson, a struggling lawyer, because of an argument about his domineering attitude toward her. She marries Jim Drake, the son of a bank president, but the elder Drake, thinking that she married for money, disinherits his son. They move to a small flat in Harlem where she works to support Drake, but he soon loses interest in married life, takes up with another woman, and agrees to a scheme proposed by a lawyer friend to frame Eleanor as an adulteress, win a divorce, and be taken back by his father. He moves out of the flat and sends word to Eleanor that he is ill in a hotel. Her visit and sufficient planted evidence make it appear that she had been there having an affair with another man. Frederick helps Eleanor compile evidence to vindicate herself and convict Drake and his associates who are arrested. Frederick and Eleanor then resume their romance.

Dir: Maurice Elvey

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

A lady marries a horse trainer but withholds herself until her crippled brother is cured.

Dir: Frank Beal

Young Nella Babard is alone in her cabin, left there temporarily by her parents who have gone to the city. A pair of escaped convicts, fleeing from the police, come upon the cabin and duck inside. One of the pair, "Sporting Chance" Johnson, was imprisoned for a crime he didn't commit and he and Nella find themselves attracted to each other. They sleep together and in the morning Johnson goes out looking for a minister to marry them, but he is caught and sent back to prison. Nella later discovers she is pregnant and, realizing Johnson isn't coming back, agrees to marry a writer she is working for. Three years later the writer, looking for material for a story, travels to the prison and meets a prisoner who is about to get out, and when the writer hears his story, he asks the man to stay at his home until he gets back on his feet. The writer doesn't know that the prisoner is 'Sporting Chance Johnson", and Johnson doesn't know that the writer is now Nella's husband and they have a daughter--Johnson's child. Complications ensue.

Dir: Bruno Ziener

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

A fascinating piece of cinema that shares thematic elements.

Dir: Frank Beal

James Warrington, a successful architect, is fortunate in the possession of a happy home presided over by a loving wife and gladdened by the presence of a fine young son, Jerry Warrington. When the morning newspaper is thrown into the home carrying in staring headlines the news that war has been declared, the husband hides the newspaper and goes to his office. Frank Archer is a partner of James Warrington, and when Warrington reaches the office. Archer informs him that he, Archer, has determined to enlist as a volunteer. Archer tells Warrington that he, too, should enlist. Warrington hesitates, thinking of his wife and little son. Then his duty confronts him and he agrees to join a volunteer regiment with Archer. Then comes the first note, of sadness, for Warrington tells his wife that he has enlisted. Archer lives with his little daughter, Mercy, in a house adjoining that occupied by the Warringtons. He and his daughter call at the Warrington home. There Mrs. Warrington pleads with Archer to remember his little daughter and to remain at home, but he answers firmly that it is his duty as well as Warrington's duty to go to the firing line. The bugler sounds the "assembly" and the regiment which includes Warrington and Archer, marches away and Mrs. Warrington watches with tear-dimmed eyes. Time passes. Battles have been won and lost, and father's all too brief notes to little Jerry and his mother cease. Then one day Archer arrives home. He has lost an arm. His little daughter Mercy is overjoyed that Papa has returned home again. Archer calls on Mrs. Warrington. As little Jerry and Mercy play together in the yard, Archer tells Mrs. Warrington of the heroic death of her husband. Later the newspaper headlines declare that peace has been restored. Seventeen years pass, and Jerry has grown to young manhood and Mercy has blossomed into a beautiful young woman. Their childish affection has grown apace and they are sweethearts. Again comes the morning paper into the Warrington home. Mrs. Warrington reads the fateful headlines stating that after seventeen years of peace, war has again been declared and that invaders have landed upon our coast. The dawn of despair comes to the loving mother. She resolves to hide the newspaper from Jerry. But bulletin boards everywhere confront Jerry, and they state that volunteer regiments will be equipped immediately to go at once to the front. At the office, Jerry tells Archer, "It is my duty to enlist." He repairs to his home to tell his mother. She reels when she hears the news. She goes to her husband's portrait: "I lost him in war. I cannot lose you, too, my boy. Promise not to enlist." But Jerry's determination is unshaken. As war takes its toll, Mercy goes to the front as a Red Cross Nurse, while at home Jerry's mother creeps to the attic and fondles the toys belonging to Jerry when he was a child. One day Mercy Archer returns. With her father she goes to Mrs. Warrington's home. Mercy, too, tells a story just as her father told one seventeen years before. And as Jerry's mother sits gazing grief stricken into the fireplace in her cottage, oblivious of the comforting arms of Mercy, there comes a vision of a great battleship firing a broadside of guns which later dissolves into a great threshing harvesting machine at work, implying peace and industry.

Dir: Edgar Jones

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

A mail-order bride arrives at a Maine lumber camp but doesn't like her prospective husband.

Dir: Wilfred Lucas

Brian O'Farrell (Snowy Baker), is an English 'new chum' who takes a job at an Australian cattle station. He is teased by station hands because of his appearance (including spats and a monocle) but he soon impresses them with his skills at riding and boxing. The station manager, John MacDonald (Wilfred Lucas), takes O'Farrell to Sydney to meet his daughter Edith (Kathleen Key) who is working in the slums. Edith is kidnapped by criminals after witnessing a crime but O'Farrell rescues her. It is later revealed he is the owner of the station.

Dir: Frank Beal

A visual fragment from the archive: The thematic resonance of I'm Glad My Boy Grew Up to Be a Soldier perfectly mirrors the editorial trajectory of our deep dive.

When young Eva Stanley comes home from college, she finds that her mother is deeply involved in the movement to rescue "wayward" girls. Eva's boyfriend John Gilbert is sent west on a government job, and Eva finds herself lonely and neglected. She is lured onto the yacht of lecherous Leo Spencer, the dissolute brother of the district attorney. Leo drugs and then seduces Eva. When John returns home he finds that Eva is pregnant. They decide it's best for Eva to have an abortion, but when the D.A. finds out about it, he has them both John and the doctor arrested.

Dir: Harley Knoles

Jim McDonald, the foreman of a shipbuilding plant and head of the labor union, strives to combat the anarchistic propaganda being put forth by Klimoff, the leader of a Bolshevik gang whose goal is to disrupt the country with strikes and anarchy. Despite McDonald's efforts, a strike is called, resulting in chaos. McDonald's child is knocked down by runaway horses abandoned by their striking driver, and dies. Mob scenes take place in America, as well as in Russia. Eventually, the unrest is quelled with an armistice called between Capital and Labor for a year, during which time wages are to be increased to reflect the cost of living, and leaders are to work out a common plan for their mutual advantage. The strikers now realize that they have been pawns of the Bolsheviks and call off the strike, agreeing to the plan.

Dir: Alexander Butler

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