Author Archive: Retro

Raised by an Indian tribe as one of their own, a white man attempts to ward off the derision of his own race when he becomes an employee of the famous Hudson Bay Company. Action specialist B. Reeve Eason directs Raoul Walsh’s thespian brother, George Walsh, in this lower-budget programmer.

Russian laborer becomes a scab during a workers’ strike, and is then coerced into joining the military just before the October Revolution. English titles. Dir. Vsevolod Pudovkin.

Kirby kills a man in self-defense and becomes a fugitive from the police.

Lang’s conclusive masterpiece of futuristic fantasy depicts life in the year 2000, as a member of the idle ruling class goes underground to see how the dehumanized working class gets along. Excellent, ahead-of-its-time, Sci-Fi/Fantasy film that defined a genre. Produced by Erich Pommer. English titles. Dir. Fritz Lang

A young woman visiting in Mexico is kidnapped by a gang of bandits, who drag her through the rugged wilderness to their hideout. She manages to leave word for her friend Bill, who knows the country well. But when Bill cannot find a horse, his only available form of transportation is his roadster. Nevertheless, he is determined to come to her rescue, even though it means trying to drive the car across miles of rocky, broken terrain.

A woman with a sordid past is redeemed by love in this silent melodrama from low-budget Sanford Productions. Margarita Darlow (Ligio Di Golconda) refuses a marriage proposal from David Orland (Gaston Glass), a young man about to leave for Paris. Earlier, Margarita had sought financial help from Edwin Ramsey (Wilfred Lucas), who had seduced her, put her up in his apartment as his “niece,” and “rented” her out to his equally unsavory friend Donald Gorham (Bryant Washburn). David forgives her, however, and Margarita follows him to Paris. Forced to work as a model, Margarita is confronted with her past by Ramsey, who blackmails her into returning with him to New York. On the verge of suicide, Margarita is rescued by Mary Cullen (Gladys Brockwell), Gorham’s tough but kindhearted moll. David, meanwhile, kills the nasty Ramsey in a duel.

Joe Laird (Carl Gantvoort) is a railroad clerk who works to support his lazy wife Gladys (Betty Brice) and their two young children. He gets a promotion as secretary to the company president and asks his mother May (Claire McDowell) to live with the family after she loses her home. May is a Christian Scientist faith healer who cures her grandson’s crippled limb. When his Joe’s boss’s daughter suffers back injuries from a fall, May is called on to pray for the girl’s health in this religious propaganda drama.

Outlaw is wounded on his last heist and is nursed back to health by a kindly miner and his pretty daughter. He tries to go straight, but his past catches up to him when two miners recognize him from a wanted poster.