The Auteur's Selection Complementing the Tone of The Love Swindle: ...

Dir: John Francis Dillon

Snobbish attorney Charles 'Beauty' Steele loses his wife due to his drinking and his airs at the same time that his brother-in-law absconds with funds belonging to one of Steele's clients. In search of the thief, Steele is attacked and left for dead. He is rescued by a kind couple, but suffers from amnesia. He starts life afresh and is happy, until the return of his memory sends him back to resolve his old involvements.

Dir: John Francis Dillon

A visual fragment from the archive: The thematic resonance of Heiress for a Day perfectly mirrors the editorial trajectory of our deep dive.

Working as a manicurist at the Ritz, Helen Thurston, is in love with her wealthy patron, Jack Standring, but the young man's mother wants him to marry a rich debutante. Helen is informed that she has inherited her grandfather's millions, and she proceeds as quickly as possible to acquire expensive clothing and jewelry on credit. Jack, however, is not impressed. Soon Helen learns that she has inherited only $1,000, the remainder of the fortune having gone to her cousin Spindrift. The creditors hound her for their money, and at a grand ball at the Standring home, a detective threatens to arrest her. Touched by her poverty, Jack decides to elope with her. Finally Spindrift violates the conditions of the will, and Helen inherits the entire fortune.

Dir: John Francis Dillon

Adventuress Leonie Sobatsky falls in love with a young man named Nevil Trask, and he with her. Trask doesn't know that Leonie is actually the head of an international smuggling ring--and Leonie doesn't know that Trask is an undercover Secret Service agent assigned to break up the ring and capture its head.

Dir: John Francis Dillon

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

The relatives of dying Edward Woodruff, Nina Leffingwell, her brother Frederic, and her cousin Basil, whom she wants to marry, scheme to inherit Woodruff's wealth. Since Woodruff continually calls for an imagined granddaughter, the child of his daughter who died before they could patch up a quarrel which estranged them, Nina gets Doll, a Follies girl, to impersonate the granddaughter, try to endear herself to Woodruff, and thus inherit the money. Doll would then be paid off and the relatives would get the inheritance. When Doll's administrations cause Woodruff to recover, Nina sends for Woodruff's grandson Ned, whom he disowned for marrying beneath him, hoping that Ned will send Doll away. When Ned seems to fall in love with Doll, Nina tells Woodruff that Ned and Doll are secretly meeting in the estate lodge. Woodruff investigates and finds that Doll and Ned are married and have a baby boy. Delighted, Woodruff forgives Ned.

Dir: John Francis Dillon

A young lady, who "hates the law" rises from the tenements to society. Financial reverses lead her to commit a series of burglaries as "The Bird". She becomes involved with the detective investigating the burglaries. After she confesses and pays for her crimes, they marry.

Dir: John Francis Dillon

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

Gentleman crook Boston Blackie answers a want ad for an expert safe cracker placed by Doris Macon, who claims a moral right to the safe's contents. She hires Blackie, and they break into the house where the safe is kept. Blackie blows up the safe just as owner Captain von Hoffmeier returns home. Doris disappears with papers from inside the safe, while Blackie takes phonograph records, which, when played with a special needle, reveal secrets that implicate von Hoffmeier as a German political spy. Doris is actually the girl friend of a secret service man who has followed them to the house. Blackie's talents are praised, and he goes to work for the government.

Dir: John Francis Dillon

An amusing satire on the simple village maiden who comes to the great city and falls a victim to its alluring temptations.

Dir: John Francis Dillon

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

George Carter, a revolutionist in South America, is the exact double of Frederick Marston, a famous artist in Paris. Carter is betrayed by a comrade and is sentenced to be shot. He takes a desperate chance and escapes on board a vessel bound for London. In Paris Marston is stabbed by a model because he does not return her love. The wound incapacitates him from painting, and leaves an ugly scar, and he goes to America on a vacation. Highwaymen attack him, inflicting injuries which cause a total loss of memory. The robbers leave nothing in his pockets but the key to his Paris studio, and Marston adopts the name of Robert Anglo-Saxon. Five years later he falls in love with Duska Filson, a noted beauty, and at a dinner given by her he meets Gen. Robero, a South American ambassador, the man who condemned Carter to death. Robero believes Saxon is Carter and writes Saxon a letter warning him that if he marries Duska he will have Saxon extradited to South America and shot. Robero convinces him that he is Carter and Saxon goes to South America to pay the penalty of the crimes he believes himself guilty of. On the boat he meets Rodman, Carter's betrayer. Duska follows Saxon to South America and learns that Saxon has proven his innocence and departed two days before. She sends him a wireless and he has the ship stopped and lands at Puerto Frio, and learns that the revolution has broken out. In fighting his way through the lines he is shot and is placed on board a vessel bound for France by Rodman. Rodman tells Duska what has occurred and she follows Saxon to France. Saxon's mind clears and through the medium of the key which fits the lock of his house his identity is clearly established. Duska learns that Saxon is the world-renowned artist and his a wife who is very ill. When Saxon reaches his home he finds Duska at the bedside of his wife, who has just died. Duska respects Saxon's grief and departs, with her dream of happiness shattered.

Dir: John Francis Dillon

Brewster, the bean king, has an option of renewal on a certain bean canning plant owned by Ellis. Ellis does not desire to renew and hires Wingate, a shyster lawyer, to help him. Brewster has to send Betty to renew the contract. Later he sends his lawyer to help her and Ellis' man persuades her that he is a plotter. There follows plot and counter-plot, but all-innocently Betty carries the day.

Dir: John Francis Dillon

Daphne Trowbridge, an impulsive and obstinate but nonetheless kindhearted young woman, lives with her aunt and uncle on their country estate. Daphne falls in love with Tom Dunstan, but when she learns that Mrs. Trowbridge favors the young man, she deserts him, whereupon he departs for the woods brokenhearted. Because her aunt dislikes Gerald, Daphne accepts his proposal, but on the day of the wedding, she discovers that Mrs. Trowbridge has liked him from the beginning. Furious at her aunt's scheming, Daphne hires the first man she meets, who happens to be a heavily bearded lumberman, to marry her and then leave. Later, however, her hired husband abducts her to his cabin in the woods, where he eventually succeeds in taming her. After he rescues her from two lecherous lumberjacks, Daphne discovers that her husband is Tom, whom she had loved all along.