Hidden Genre Gems for Fans of The Pulse of Life: Cult Guide

Dir: Rex Ingram

At a meeting of the Hop Sing Tong, a Chinaman chooses the red bean and is destined to kill one of his countrymen. Later this Chinaman kills his condemned countryman, and the gang manage to throw the officers off the track of the murderer. However, the police suspect that it is the work of the Hop Sing Tong and are instructed by the chief to arrest Charley Sing, as one Chinaman is as good as another. Big Tom Hogan, the Tammany leader, is visited by Buck Mahoney, a gang leader, a friend of Charley Sing's, who has come to get Hogan to have the Chinaman released, for he knows he is innocent. Hogan forces the Governor to pardon Charley Sing. Samuel Savinsky, the keeper of a pawnshop, is thought much of by his wife and family, who never suspect his affair with Neva Sacon. He gives her money and jewels, and becomes jealous of Harvey Wilson, a reporter. Paul Rasnov, a sculptor and a dope fiend, pawns valuable trinkets at Savinsky's store to buy opium at the store of Ah Wong, the leader of the Three Brothers Tong. Tea Rose, Ah Wong's wife, consents to run away with Paul. Buck meets Harvey and says he will show him secrets of Chinatown if Harvey will expose the Boss in his paper. Buck guides Harvey into the building of the Hop Sing Tong. Harvey is enthusiastic over a silver flower, and Buck, seeing no one is looking, tells him to keep it. That evening Harvey gives Neva Sacon, the café dancer, the poppy, the Flower of Doom. The next day Harvey and Neva go to Chinatown and stop at Ah Wong's store to eat. The proprietor sees Neva and makes plans to kidnap her. While Harvey is in another room, a panel opens behind her and she is pulled through the opening. When the reporter returns a servant tells him that the lady has just left. He hurries to tell Buck about the strange disappearance. The Chinamen leave Neva in a small room. Left alone with a Chinaman at one time, the girl offers him a curious ring which Savinsky has given her, if he will deliver a message to Harvey at the newspaper office. The Chinaman is informed that the reporter is not in, and thus satisfied, the Chink goes to Savinsky's pawnshop to get rid of the ring. The pawnbroker recognizes the ring and forces the Chinaman to tell now he got it. With a policeman Savinsky starts for Ah Wong's, but when the officer threatens to break down a door, Savinsky is frightened, and hurriedly leaves the place. Buck appeals to Charley Sing to find Neva, and following Charley's suggestion, Tea Rose is kidnapped while a letter written in Chinese is sent to Ah Wong telling him of Tea Rose and offering her in exchange for Neva. Ah Wong consents, and that evening Neva is restored to her people and Tea Rose to her husband. Savinsky, seeing Neva again in the company of Harvey, realizes he has lost and goes to her to demand the jewels he has given her. Harvey returns with Neva, and when Savinsky begins to quarrel about his rights, the reporter throws him out. Harvey proposes to Neva who accepts his offer. Warned by a spying Chink that Tea Rose and Rasnov are going to run away that evening, Ah Wong plans to spoil their party. He hides in the place where the girl is expecting to meet Rasnov, and springing on her drags her into a room and strangles her. Rasnov waits for Tea Rose, and Ah Wong rushes in at him. They fight, and the Chinaman lifts Rasnov up to hurl him against the wall when his foot slips and his skull is crushed against the stone steps of the grating. Having lost Tea Rose, Rasnov consoles himself with opium.

Dir: Rex Ingram

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

Julian Randolph, a dishonest attorney whose specialty is furnishing phony jurors, is offered a judgeship if he clears Clifford Nordhoff, the brother of powerful politician "Boss" Nordhoff, of a murder charge. With the aid of his usual tools, Randolph succeeds and is given a position on the bench. Here he is expected to obey the commands of the men who secured his appointment, but Ranoldph falls in love with Laura Nelson, a girl of upstanding social position, and resolves to follow the straight path. He breaks off with Roxana Frisbee, an adventuress who had assisted him in his shady schemes, and refuses to hand down a decision in favor of the political machine. In the end, Randolph upholds justice, wins Laura as his wife, and has the gratification of seeing Roxana also go straight.

Dir: Rex Ingram

When the king is drugged and abducted by his ambitious brother, a lookalike relative must take his place to keep the evil sibling off the throne.

Dir: Rex Ingram

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

The captain of a sailing ship has an affair with the wife of one of his passengers, and gets mixed up in a mutiny at sea and a revolution.

Dir: Rex Ingram

Bill Carson is sentenced to 12 years for housebreaking. He vows that he will, upon ending his term, have vengeance upon George Devereaux, the prosecuting attorney whose speech swayed the jury to conviction. Carson's little daughter Peggy is being raised by his pal Skinny McGee; the mother died of shock after Carson's conviction. When Skinny dies, the girl Peggy turns to picking pockets for a livelihood, Skinny having brought her to proficiency in this line as her only education. There is a scene pictured in the board rooms of a reform organization. Devereaux accepts a challenge that he cannot take a criminal and reform him by improved and beneficial surroundings. Peggy is brought into a police station on charge of picking pockets, and is chosen to be the one upon whom Devereaux shall practice his experiment. Taking her to his palatial home, Devereaux seeks for two years to train Peggy in the better way. His efforts are variously successful, and finally a young man proposes marriage to Peggy and is accepted. Upon arriving at the church Peggy discovers that she is in love with Devereaux, and flees from the wedding party in consternation. She decides to return to her old life, and departs from the Devereaux home without making her intentions known. About this time Carson ends his term of imprisonment. He seeks to conclude his vengeance by shooting Devereaux, and for that purpose waits for him to come from his house. Carson is hiding behind a tree, when he is recognized by Peggy and when, on the instant that Carson is about to fire a revolver at Devereaux, the girl throws herself before her father and receives in her own body the bullet intended for Devereaux. The story acquires its ending in the recovery of Peggy, the avowed reformation of her father, and the final picture shows Peggy once more established happily in the home where we are led to believe she will, in legal and ceremonial form, eventually become a permanent resident.

Dir: Rex Ingram

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

Joe Bascom, only son of a widow, lives in a Connecticut village. He loves Elsie Tillinger, daughter of the deacon, the wealthiest man in town; but the deacon forbids Joe to speak to her. Joe leaves home to make his way in the world, but his employer, Mr. Morgan, a wealthy racehorse owner, accuses him unjustly of stealing. Actually, Morgan's son, Lester, is guilty of the crime, but Joe is sentenced to a prison term; there he becomes acquainted with Mugsy and Gilly, two crooks. Meanwhile, though courted by young Morgan, Elsie remains faithful to Joe. Mrs. Bascom, who makes superlative peach jam from her orchard, is in debt to the Deacon Tillinger, and he intends to buy her orchard and make Lester head of a jam industry. But Joe arrives with his crook friends, outwits the deacon, and takes over the peach orchard. Mugsy and Gilly are reformed by the goodness of Joe's mother and fall in love with Betty and Jessie; and after exposing Lester Morgan's deceit, Joe marries Elsie.

Dir: Rex Ingram

Guido Capanelli is an adventurer, his good looks and courtly bearing helping him through many successes. He has gained entrance to the best society, incidentally making the acquaintance of Princess Dione, whose father. Prince Paul Ragosin, is in feeble health. Prince Ragosin has expressed a wish that Princess Dione shall marry Feodor Strogoff, and on his death bed gains the promise from Dione that his wish shall be gratified. Feodor allows Guido Capanelli to be Dione's greatest source of sympathy in the hours of her grief, and in consequence, Guido so ingratiates himself with the Princess that she marries the adventurer, regardless of her pledge. Previous to Prince Ragosin's death Dione became interested in Katerina Vlasoff, a girl who is a street vendor of crude images and daughter of Peter Vlasoff, a drunken beast. When the girl returns home one evening without having made a sale all day Vlasoff sends her into the streets, threatening her with harm if she does not return with money to buy him wine. Katerina is accosted by Guido Capanelli, and; submits to his advances that she may have money to take home. She is so humiliated that she is glad to take her brother's advice to visit Princess Dione, the friend of everybody who is poor and in distress. Touched by Katerina's story, Princess Dione sends the girl to a convent, having gained Prince Paul Ragosin's consent to thus befriend the outcast. After Dione and Guido are married, Katerina returns from, the convent to make her home with her benefactress. Guido, under threat of exposing Katerina, demands a renewal of their relations and the deceitful couple start at once to plot against Princess Dione. When the Princess falls ill, they appoint themselves her nurses and in neglecting to administer medicines properly create a comatose condition that closely resembles death. The Princess is buried and Guido and Katerina establish themselves in control of her lands and fortune. When Dione had married Guido she received a book from Feodor Strogoff with an inscription in effect that he would always stand ready to befriend the woman he loved, but had discarded Slim for another. After the Princess is entombed, Feodor visits the sepulcher and discovers that Dione is alive, having simply been in a trance. Convinced, by what she herself witnessed of the treachery of her husband and Katerina, the Princess goes with Feodor to Rome, for the purpose of biding their time for vengeance. Guido and Katerina visit Rome and Guido becomes enamored of a famous beauty who has become the toast of the town. The woman is slow to accept Guido's advances, but finally tells him that a famous ring that has been buried with the Princess Dione will be the price of her affection. When Guido returns to the sepulcher to rob his wife's corpse, he finds the coffin empty. As he turns away from the tomb, he sees what he believes to be the ghost of the Princess. The apparition drives him insane and he runs to a nearby cliff and throws himself into the ocean. Katerina returns to the street from whence she came and Princess Dione and Feodor find happiness in marriage.

Dir: Rex Ingram

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

An extended family split up in France and Germany find themselves on opposing sides of the battlefield during World War I.

Dir: Rex Ingram

Pretty Manhattan model Marion Buckley receives a marriage proposal from Warren Rogers, a wealthy department store owner, but is reluctant to accept it because of her affair with her employer Leon Kessler, who promised to marry her. Kessler agrees to keep quiet about the affair and Marion Buckley. All goes well until one day Kessler visits the couple and proposes marriage to Rogers' teenage daughter Ardath. Knowing that her husband knows nothing of she and Kessler's history together, Marion tells him of her previous affair with Kessler, with disastrous results.

Dir: Rex Ingram

To teach his fickle daughter, Jacqueline, the dangers of faithlessness, novelist Léon de Séverac reads her his latest story: In maneuvering for the favors of Zareda, a captivating Parisian adventuress, Baron de Maupin sends his son, Ivan, to war and takes the poison he intended for the Marquis Ferroni. Zareda marries the marquis, but she causes him to duel with Ivan, her true love, when Ivan returns. Ferroni is vanquished but lives long enough to imprison Zareda and kill Ivan. Jacqueline is impressed by this story and accepts her faithful suitor, Henri.