Must-Watch List in the Vein of You'd Be Surprised: Cult Guide

Dir: Vernon Stallings

Krazy Kat is held in jail and Ignatz finally bails him out after encountering "guilt".

Dir: Robert Thornby

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

Mary Willard takes over her father's railroad after his death. Her major competitor is a ruthless crook named Harvey Judson. She arranges for Judson to be kidnapped and taken to an isolated spot deep in the forest and turned loose to fend for himself. She accompanies the kidnappers to the wild and Judson, not knowing who she is, begins to fall in love with her. Complications ensue.

Dir: Arthur Rosson

A fascinating piece of cinema that shares thematic elements.

Dir: Arthur Rosson

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

Doc Saunders, an alcoholic, leaves his little daughter Mayme in the care of his sister and goes West to start a new life. In the little town of Sago, Doc becomes an avowed prohibitionist, thus earning the enmity of Art the saloon keeper. Back East, Mayme grows to adulthood and marries reporter Jimmy Baggs who has just been hired by the newspaper in Sago. When Jimmy begins to drink heavily, Mayme appeals to the town doctor for help. Doc Saunders, recognizing her, chooses not to disclose that she is his daughter, but instead invites them to move into his house for treatment. Jimmy reforms until one day he is sent to the saloon to get a statement on the liquor question for his paper. When Jimmy returns home drunk, Doc, enraged, invades the saloon brandishing a gun and shooting wildly. Doc is arrested and tried, but pronounced not guilty by a jury that sympathizes with him. With Art's power finally broken, Doc confesses to Mayme that she is his daughter, and the family sees an end to their troubles.

Dir: Reggie Morris

A fascinating piece of cinema that shares thematic elements.

Dir: Arthur Rosson

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

Millionaire spendthrift Sam Morgan marries Constance Winwood, who tries to break Sam's spending habits by convincing Downer, the trustee of Sam's inheritance, to pretend to abscond with Sam's money. During their honeymoon, Sam spends his $10.30 pocket money, then discovers that his checks are bouncing. Unable to pay an increasingly-large taxi fare, Sam and Constance keep the cab and its sleepy driver engaged after they are thrown out of a hotel. After a friendly thief gets Sam a job in a herring refinery, Sam uses his rudimentary knowledge of Spanish to buy a shipload of herring from a South American dealer and sell it to the refinery's directors, who know no Spanish, thus making enough profit to pay his now-exorbitant taxi bill. Constance confesses her scheme, and although it seems that Downer really has absconded, he finally returns. Wealthy again, Sam and Constance adorn their bedroom with taxi meters and headlights.

Dir: Henry Edwards

A millionaire bets £25,000 that he can earn his own living for six months.

Dir: Arthur Rosson

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

Dreamer dairyman Phineas Dobbs of Cow Hollow suddenly acquires a fortune when oil is discovered on his ranch, and celebrates by throwing a party for the whole town. One day a young woman comes to town, delayed by train trouble. Dobbs rescues her from the town bully, and agrees to follow her to San Francisco. The woman is actually a princess who is being forced into a marriage with a man who wants to share her throne. Dobbs rides by Market Street to the St. Francis Hotel in his Western garb, and performs daring stunts to rescue the princess in distress. Together they free the princess' father. Dobbs then returns to Cow Hollow, and the princess gives up her throne to become Mrs. Phineas Dobbs.

Dir: Jerome Storm

Ne'er-do-well Homer Cavender ventures to the city from Mainsville in an effort to find fame and fortune. Both elude him, and after clerking for two years, Homer returns home for a vacation. Impressed by his flashy clothes, the townspeople assume that Homer has achieved success. Attempting to win Rachel Prouty from his rival, Arthur Machim, Homer continues the deception by announcing that his employer, Kort and Bailly, has dispatched him to enroll stockholders for a proposed new plant to be built in Mainsville. Machim discovers the sham and denounces Homer as a crook. Meanwhile, Homer returns to New York, convinces his employers of the merits of his plan and comes home triumphant, with a proposal for both the new plant and for Rachel's hand in marriage.

Dir: Maurice Campbell

Carver Endicott, a young sophisticate, is rejected by his fiancée for being too foppish and dull. When she feigns an interest in his father, Carver attempts to disgrace his family name by working as a farmhand and later as a busboy in a hotel. However, the newspapers only praise him for his self-sacrificing principles; and finding that he cannot bring shame to the family through menial labor, he takes up with a notorious actress. But when this maneuver also fails, he returns to his former fiancée, who has no further complaint about his being an inexperienced dullard.