Author Archive: Retro

Woman cares for nine orphans while trying to fend off starvation and kidnappers. Dir. Victor Saville.

When her mother remarries, a young Belgian girl is left behind with her nurse, but when Germany invades the country, she is sent to America to find her mother.

This film was one of Mary Pickford’s attempts to add at least a touch of maturity to her little girl characterizations. She is a Kentucky mountain girl in this romantic adventure film, and Harold Goodwin is the boy who befriends her. Sam DeGrasse was the villain. Future silent-screen idol Jack Gilbert also had a small role.

Penniless girl agrees to marry a bullying suitor when he shows her fabricated proof that her long-absent fiance is dead, but when her original man shows up, the trouble begins. Written and Produced by James Oliver Curwood. Dir. Herbert Wilcox.

The only remaining footage (5 minutes) of THE MIRACLE MAN, a film about a gang of misfits, one of which can dislocate his limbs, who terrorize Chinatown sightseers. *PLUS* The earliest existing Chaney film, a version of the life of Francois Villon.

Tod Browning’s tale of San Francisco underworld crime and Lon Chaney’s dual role as Black Mike Sylva, a murderous thug, and Ah Wing, a small-time Chinese pacifist. Co-starring Priscilla Dean as a tough moll, this hard-edged film is a pinnacle among the Browning-Chaney crime dramas. We recommend the film itself as a required excursion into the dark world of director Browning.

Sick woman is cured when she touches the Holy Grail. Dir. Clarence Brown.

Underworld crime boss is driven by an overwhelming desire for revenge on the doctor who mistakenly amputated his legs as a young boy.

Scarred fiend haunts an opera house and kidnaps Philbin as his singing protege in this adaption of the Gaston Leroux classic. Unmasking sequence still packs a punch! Contains hand-colored masked ball sequence. Dir. Phil Rosen.