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RICH MAN’S FOLLY – George Bancroft, Frances Dee

Rich Man’s Folly (1931)
Direction: John Cromwell
Screenplay: Grover Jones and Edward E. Paramore Jr.; from Charles Dickens’ novel Dombey and Son
Cast: George Bancroft, Frances Dee, Robert Ames, David Durand, Juliette Compton, Dorothy Peterson
 

Directed by the respected John Cromwell and based on Charles Dickens‘ Dombey and Son, Rich Man’s Folly features George Bancroft as a ruthless, egotistical shipping tycoon whose only concern is his work, all the while grooming his young son so he’ll one day take over the family business. In the meantime, the rest of family is completely ignored.
That is the kind of role Bancroft did best: Larger-than life, driven, and arrogant men who usually meet a towering, humbling defeat in the final reel. Also in the [...]

THE PONY EXPRESS – Betty Compson, Ricardo Cortez

The Pony Express (1925)
Direction: James Cruze
Screenplay: Walter Woods; from Woods and Henry James Forman’s story
Cast: Betty Compson, Ricardo Cortez, George Bancroft, Ernest Torrence, Wallace Beery, Al Hart
 

The Pony Express is a rousing James Cruze Western depicting the founding of the Pony Express with a backdrop of political ambitions concerning a senator’s plans to get California to secede from the United States so he can build his own empire.
A great cast and Cruze’s direction keep this one interesting — even though Ricardo Cortez in a period film seems woefully out of place and pretty Betty Compson’s role is more or less that of an ingenue, merely requiring her to look good while reacting to the things going [...]

THE RAVEN – Henry B. Walthall – d: Charles Brabin

The Raven (1915)
Direction: Charles Brabin
Screenplay: Charles Brabin; from George Cochran Hazelton’s novel and play The Raven: The Love Story of Edgar Allan Poe
Cast: Henry B. Walthall, Warda Howard
 

Starring Henry B. Walthall, The Raven is an Essanay feature depicting the life of Edgar Allan Poe, starting with his childhood and going all the way to his marriage to his cousin (played by the little-known Warda Howard).
Charles Brabin’s direction is uneven: At some points it’s stagy and rudimentary; at other points, Brabin creates some remarkably striking and eerie visual effects, including a bravura scene for Walthall in which he descends further and further into madness following the death of his wife. Brabin visualizes this with a barrage [...]

M’LISS – Mary Pickford, Thomas Meighan

M’Liss (1918)
Direction: Marshall Neilan
Screenplay: Frances Marion; from Bret Harte’s story
Cast: Mary Pickford, Thomas Meighan, Theodore Roberts, Tully Marshall, Charles Ogle, Monte Blue, Winifred Greenwood
 

Mary Pickford, Thomas Meighan in M’Liss
 

Directed by Marshall Neilan and written by Frances Marion – two frequent Mary Pickford collaborators — M’Liss is one of Pickford’s very best films. In this comedy-drama, Pickford plays a spirited and unruly mountain girl, that’s the M’Liss of the title, who falls in love with the new schoolteacher (Thomas Meighan) — who is later falsely accused of murder.
Pickford, by then already a superstar, gives a sterling performance; she is ably supported by (future star) Thomas Meighan as the schoolteacher, as well as a fine collection of character actors including [...]

THE GREAT WHITE TRAIL – Doris Kenyon

The Great White Trail (1917)
Direction: Leopold Wharton and Theodore Wharton
Screenplay: Gardner Hunting and Leopold Wharton
Cast: Doris Kenyon, Paul Gordon, Richard Stewart, Thomas Holding, Louise Hotaling, Hans Roberts, Edgar Davenport
 

Some films have "everything except the kitchen sink" as the saying goes. Well, the 1917 melodrama The Great White Trail has a plot that has everything and about three kitchen sinks as well, as it briskly makes its way from one improbable situation after another before everything is happily resolved in the final reel.
Doris Kenyon plays a happy young wife and mother. When her irresponsible brother appeals to her for help, her husband (Paul Gordon) misunderstands the situation, believing her to be unfaithful. He turns her out of the [...]

HER NIGHT OF ROMANCE – Constance Talmadge, Ronald Colman

Her Night of Romance (1924)
Direction: Sidney Franklin
Screenplay: Hans Kräly
Cast: Constance Talmadge, Ronald Colman, Jean Hersholt, Albert Grand, Robert Rendel
 

Directed by Sidney Franklin and written by frequent Ernst Lubitsch collaborator Hans Kräly, Her Night of Romance is certainly on my list of top three favorite films at Cinesation 2009.
Constance Talmadge, whose extant films are hard to come by, is always a delightful comedienne. In Her Night of Romance, Talmadge plays Dorothy Adams, a wealthy young woman who goes about in hideous disguises to ward off fortune hunters only interested in her money. Eventually, Dorothy meets and falls in love with an impoverished English Lord (Ronald Colman), who is mistaken for a doctor. The "doctor" goes along with [...]

THE MARINES ARE COMING – William Haines, Esther Ralston

The Marines Are Coming (1934)
Direction: David Howard
Screenplay: James Gruen; from Colbert Clark and John Rathmell’s story
Cast: William Haines, Esther Ralston, Conrad Nagel, Armida, Edgar Kennedy, Hale Hamilton
 

The Marines Are Coming was a last-minute substitution for the 1936 version of M’Liss, starring Anne Shirley, which was originally scheduled but didn’t arrive in time for Cinesation 2009.
William Haines‘ last film, The Marines Are Coming follows Haines’ usual formula: a cocky, womanizing soldier (Haines) vies with his superior officer (Conrad Nagel) for the hand of beautiful girl (Esther Ralston). Inevitably, Haines’ character later proves his worth when he saves his fellow American officers from a band of Mexican bandits.
Though hardly a good film, The Marines Are Coming [...]

PILLARS OF SOCIETY – Henry B. Walthall – d: Raoul Walsh

Pillars of Society (1916)
Direction: Raoul Walsh
Screenplay: From a novel by Henrik Ibsen
Cast: Henry B. Walthall, Mary Alden, Juanita Archer, George Beranger, Josephine Crowell, Olga Grey
 

Pillars of Society is a film about hypocrisy, having its basis on a story by Ibsen. The Birth of a Nation hero Henry B. Walthall (right) plays the son of a Norwegian shipping company; in his youth, he goes to Paris to study and has an affair with a married Bohemian actress. However, his brother-in-law is falsely accused of having said affair with the actress; he protects Walthall by accepting the blame and leaving for America.
Years later, the brother-in-law returns and demands that Walthall clear his name. Fearing that if the [...]

CROOKED STREETS – Ethel Clayton

Crooked Streets (1920)
Direction: Paul Powell
Screenplay: Edith M. Kennedy; from a story by Samuel Merwin
Cast: Ethel Clayton, Jack Holt, Clyde Fillmore, Josephine Crowell
 

 

Beautiful Ethel Clayton, a major star in the 1910s, plays a young woman who takes a job as secretary to a Professor of antiquities about to embark upon a trip to China. Clayton, however, has a secret motive for wanting to get to China.
Crooked Streets is an excellent action-packed drama with a particularly impressive lengthy chase sequence in which Clayton rides alone to a dangerous part of town and is attacked by a massive crowd of Chinese locals. The film also offers a great fight sequence between Jack Holt and a Chinese thug who [...]

O MIMI SAN – Sessue Hayakawa, Mildred Harris

O Mimi San (1914)
Direction: Charles Miller
Screenplay: Thomas H. Ince (unconfirmed)
Cast: Sessue Hayakawa, Mildred Harris, Tsuru Aoki
 

O Mimi San is historically important as Japanese actor Sessue Hayakawa’s first film. In it, Hayakawa plays a prince who goes to a retreat after an attempt on his life is made; once there he falls in love with a young woman (Mildred Harris, future wife of Charles Chaplin) but then finds himself torn between love and duty as a leader of his nation. Compounding matters, an arranged marriage (with Tsuru Aoki, Hayakawa’s own future wife) awaits him.
Directed by Charles Miller and allegedly written by Thomas H. Ince (a studio head best remembered for his "mysterious" death in 1924), O Mimi San [...]

THE DEVIL’S CLAIM – Sessue Hayakawa

The Devil’s Claim (1920)
Direction: Charles Swickard
Screenplay: J. Grubb Alexander
Cast: Sessue Hayakawa, Rhea Mitchell, Colleen Moore, William Buckley
 

In The Devil’s Claim, Sessue Hayakawa plays an Indian (!) novelist who uses his experiences with women as inspiration for his novels. Next, he encounters a young American woman (Rhea Mitchell) who tells him a story about Satan-worshipping societies and evil talismans. Her real motive, however, is to reunite the novelist with Indora (future 1920s superstar Colleen Moore), a young Persian girl whom he had abandoned.
Directed by Charles Swickard from a screenplay by J. Grubb Alexander, The Devil’s Claim is an excellent drama — and so is Hayakawa’s performance. Much of the plot is told in the "story within a story" mode, [...]

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