The Definitive Watchlist Seeking the Same Brilliance as The Phantom...

Dir: Robert N. Bradbury

A simple country girl, brutally mistreated by her stepfather, awakens first the sympathy, then the love, of The Boy. The Spider, who lusts after The Girl, makes a bargain with the stepfather and takes her to the city where, kept prisoner, she is soon broken in health and spirit. Cast out and near death, she is taken in by The Boy. Following the demise of The Spider, The Boy takes her to church, where he prays, and after many hours she is restored to health.

Dir: Maurice Elvey

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

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

Dir: Victor Heerman

In the gold fields of the Canadian Northwest, a man is falsely accused of a crime and determines that a lookalike is responsible.

Dir: Hugh Ford

The 'dead' wife of a steel process inventor returns, as does her 'dead' husband, a war amnesiac.

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

Dir: Duke Worne

Carter Holmes, master criminologist, must help the oft-kidnapped Ruth Stanhope to find the 9 daggers that will unlock the secret of the cursed Devil's Trademark!

Dir: Alexander Butler

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

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

Dir: Tod Browning

Achmet Bey, a Turkish chieftain, catches one of his many wives in adultery and murders her lover. Throwing aside the cuckolding wife, he abducts his harem an innocent girl. However, a brave American who loves her comes to her rescue.

Dir: Edgar Jones

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

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

Dir: Edward LeSaint

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: Colin Campbell

Zora, a girl of French origin, is raised by a wealthy Bedouin family after her mother Valerie dies while eloping with another man. Zora feels such great longing for the French artist Adrien that she accepts the offer of another artist, Raoul, to take her to Paris with the stipulation that if Adrien rejects her, she must give herself to him. Jan, the chieftain's son who is in love with Zora, follows the two to Paris. There Zora realizes that Adrien does not love her and discovers her real love for Jan. However, she feels bound to honor her pact with Raoul and is about to succumb to his advances when her father appears and recognizes Raoul as the man who destroyed his home years earlier. In the ensuing fight between the two men, Raoul is killed, thus freeing Zora to accept Jan's love.