Author Archive: Retro

Broadway’s Elaine Hammerstein stars in this routine silent melodrama about a girl eloping with a society wastrel only to finds herself falsely accused of a theft actually committed by him. She seeks refuge with an upstanding young man and the villain is soon brought to justice. Hammerstein, who excelled in society dramas like this one, was supported by William B. Davidson as the upstanding young gent, Huntley Gordon as the thief, Louise Prussing, Colin Campbell, and Warren Cook. The Girl from Nowhere was directed by George Archainbaud and produced by Lewis J. Selznick.

Naive farm boy goes to the big city in search of his missing sister, but gets caught up in a seedy underworld filled with drugs and fast women. Dir. Norton Parker.

Flapper-era romance. Dir. John Ince.

A young woman returns to Kentucky after several years in boarding school, and discovers that a very valuable horse that is to be entered in the Derby is about to be forfeited due to the machinations of a rival. She determines to ride the horse in the Derby and win the race.

Slapstick comedy of errors ensues when a groom’s horse eats a lady’s straw hat on the way to the wedding, and her escort demands a replacement. Written by Ren? Clair. Silent with English titles. Dir. Ren? Clair

The sagebrush sizzles as hot western woman Kent and her miner father become the targets of two thugs, one of whom is played by Oliver Hardy! Dir. Monty Banks.

Owen Davis’ 1898 barnstormer about a fun-loving socialite turned castaway on her former fiancee’s South Seas island came to the screens in 1928 courtesy of poverty row company Gotham Productions. Margaret Livingston, who played the vamp in Murnau’s Sunrise (also 1928), here acted Diane Garrett, the spoiled London society belle who promises John Lancaster to marry him on his faraway island. Time passes and Diane cannot make herself give up the social whirl. She does take an ocean journey, however, and soon finds herself a castaway on Lancaster’s island. There is a jealous native girl (Natalie Joyce), but she is soon killed off and Diane decides that her proper place is at John’s arms. In a bit of inventive casting, the role of the romantic male lead was awarded Clyde Cook, the rubber-limbed Australian comic, here appearing sans his trademark toothbrush moustache.

A little girl is lost at the depot when she leaves the train to chase a puppy. Art cares for her till her mother returns.