Summary
Gun-metal fog coils around Judson Brand’s Gothic powderworks while two bellicose nations court his death-dealing alchemy; into this sulphur-scented labyrinth he dispatches his callow heir Marshall, a ledger-toting automaton who weighs carnage only in balance sheets. Gravonia’s silk-gloved envoy Baron Von Halstyn and Sashofen’s wolf-eyed Burghoff circle like rival necromancers, each craving the white-hot Brandite that can unmake cities. Jan Bernheim—Gravonian exile, velvet-gloved vixen, patriot by conviction, avenger by instinct—plays puppet-mistress, promising Burghoff her dagger while slipping her heart to Von Halstyn, forging a double helix of loyalty and betrayal that coils tighter than any fuse. Brand’s humanitarian daughter Elinor, betrothed to pacifist pamphleteer Fosdick, discovers love is flimsy armour against her father’s iron creed of profit; when Fosdick refuses to recant, the engagement shatters like defective shrapnel. A cancelled philanthropic cheque becomes a smoking gun in Jan’s nimble fingers; she brandishes it before the swing-vote chairman Hayes, transforming charity into the spectre of graft and tilting the congressional scale toward neutrality. Yet Burghoff, cornered, lights the final act: a clandestine plot to vaporise the very crucible that feeds the war. Fosdick races through night-black country roads, coat-tails flapping like torn truce flags, arriving in time to blunt the blast but not the reckoning—Brand’s own son is atomised by a shell stamped with the family crest, a circular fate that converts the titan of gunpowder into a penitent Red Cross volunteer.
Synopsis
Judson Brand, a powder manufacturer, is approached by the envoys of two warring nations, but before entering into a contract with Baron Von Halstyn, envoy for Gravonia, he sends his son, Marshall, to investigate the country's financial condition. Burghoff, Sashofen's envoy, is advised of a blockade and instructed to halt shipments of munitions to the enemy. Both envoys try to enlist the help of Jan Bernheim, a clever political exile from Gravonia. Out of revenge, she promises to aid Burghoff, but patriotism prevails and she goes over to Von Halstyn, although pretending to remain in the employ of Burghoff. Elinor, Brand's daughter, is engaged to Fosdick, a humanitarian propagandist, who opposes Brand's mercenary attitude in furnishing munitions. Burghoff allies himself with Fosdick, and together they hope to control the vote of the congressional committee against furnishing munitions. The committee is divided in opinion and the deciding vote is with Hayes, the chairman who favors the non-participating policy. Brand quarrels with Fosdick about the issue and forces Elinor, in sympathy with Fosdick, to break her engagement, when Fosdick refuses to renounce his principle. Jan induces Burghoff to give Fosdick a check for a thousand dollars "for charitable purposes." Jan secures the canceled check which the unsuspecting Fosdick has accepted, for evidence against him, and when Von Halstyn urges her to win over Hayes to their side, she does so by showing him the check, which she makes him believe was accepted as a bribe from Burghoff. Burghoff refuses to accept defeat and proposes to Fosdick the blowing up of the powder mills, but Fosdick refuses to listen, so Burghoff undertakes it alone unknown even to Jan. Brand's son, traveling through the war zone, finds their Brandite shells being used by both sides, and is so absorbed in commercialism that he is untouched by the evidence of suffering about him. Fosdick saves the life of a child belonging to one o£ the men employed by Burghoff to blow up the mills. Brand receives a favorable report from his son and he and Von Halstyn ride over to the mill to sign up the contract, accompanied by Elinor and Jan. Fosdick, in Burghoff's office waiting for him, answers the telephone and learns of the plot to destroy the mills within an hour. He tries to reach Brand only to find that he and Elinor have gone to the mill. Fosdick drives to the mills, and through his efforts the plan only partially succeeds; no one is hurt but Mason, the man who was on the job. Fosdick is found trying to put out the fuse and is accused by Brand of attempting to blow up the mill. Mason, however, clears him when he recovers and Von Halstyn and Jan are arrested by a secret service man who has been trailing them. Brand stubbornly insists that Fosdick is to blame for it all and vows he will sign the contract away. Then the final argument presents itself, his beloved son has been killed by a Brandite shell. Later Von Halstyn and Jan are deported. Burghoff flees the country and Fosdick and Elinor are united. Brand turns from the manufacture of ammunition to Red Cross work.
Review Excerpt
"
The celluloid reels of 1916 more often conjure images of Chaplin’s tramp or Griffith’s battalions, yet lurking in that same cinematic kiln is Powder—a volatile, long-unheralded chamber-drama that detonates the sanctimony of neutrality while foreshadowing the industrialised slaughter of the twentieth century. Director Leon D. Hirsch stages his parable inside a world of charcoal-streaked skies, iron catwalks and the ceaseless hiss of nitrate, crafting what might be the first true anti-trust thril..."
