75% (2) Sally of the Sawdust 104 min, Not Rated, [Comedy] [D.W. Griffith] [02 Aug 1925]Ratings & Reviews: IMDb Reviews: 68%, Rotten Tomatoes: 82%, External Reviews
Actors: Alfred Lunt, Carol Dempster, Erville Alderson, W.C. Fields
Writer: Dorothy Donnelly (play), Forrest Halsey
External Links: Wikipedia Rotten Tomatoes IMDb Language: N/A Country: USA
Plot: Judge Foster throws his daughter out because she married a circus man. She leaves her baby girl with Prof. McGargle before she dies. Years later Sally is a dancer with whom Peyton, a son of...
Rotten Tomatoes: Pioneering filmmaker D.W. Griffith directed W.C. Fields in his first starring role in this silent comedy. When Mary Foster runs away from home to marry her sweetheart, a circus performer, she does so against the wishes of her socially prominent parents (Erville Alderson and Effie Shannon), who make no secret of their anger and disappointment. Mary begins travelling with her husband, and she makes friends with Prof. Eustace McGargle (W.C. Fields), a crusty but good-hearted cardsharp working with the carnival. When both Mary and her husband die, their daughter Sally is left in McGargle's care. Sally grows to adulthood (now played by Carol Dempster) and becomes a dancer with the circus; while McGargle has grown quite fond of the child, he wonders if she might not be better off with her grandparents, who can better provide for her and give her a stable home, though he's kept their identity a secret from her. While performing in the town of Green Meadows, Sally catches the eye of the wealthy and charming Payton Lennox (Alfred Lunt), but Sally must overcome the prejudices of Payton's parents, who do not consider a showgirl to be fit company for their son. However, a sympathetic local woman hires Sally to dance at an upcoming society recital -- not knowing that Sally is, in fact, her granddaughter. Sally of the Sawdust was based on a play that Fields had starred in on Broadway; he also starred in a sound remake entitled Poppy.
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61% (2) America 141 min, PASSED, [Drama, History, War] [D.W. Griffith] [21 Feb 1924]Ratings & Reviews: IMDb Reviews: 66%, Rotten Tomatoes: 57%, External Reviews
Actors: Carol Dempster, Charles Emmett Mack, Erville Alderson, Neil Hamilton
Writer: Robert W. Chambers (screenplay), Robert W. Chambers (story)
External Links: Wikipedia Rotten Tomatoes IMDb Language: N/A Country: USA
Plot: The first half of the film portrays the struggle of the under-armed, under-manned colonists against the British Redcoats at Lexington, Bunker Hill and Valley Forge. Other landmarks of the American Revolution shown include the Boston Tea Party, Paul Revere's midnight ride and Patrick Henry's (played by Frank McGlyyn Jr. and not played by his father Frank McGlynn Sr) inflammatory speeches to the VIrginia House of Burgesses. The second half dwells on the bloody Indian War of Mohawk Valley. THe parts are tied together by the troubled romance between a young patriot, Nathan Holden (Neal Hamilton)and Nancy Montague (Carol Dempster), the daughter of a Tory Judge.
Rotten Tomatoes: The defining moments leading to the American Revolution form the dramatic background for this tale of two lovers separated and eventually reunited in a time of extreme crisis. D.W. Griffith's last costume epic left him broke and confined to working for others the remainder of his career. Originally sixteen reels long.
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77% (1) Isn't Life Wonderful 115 min, [Drama, Romance] [D.W. Griffith] [05 Dec 1924]Ratings & Reviews: IMDb Reviews: 77%, External Reviews
Actors: Carol Dempster, Erville Alderson, Helen Lowell, Neil Hamilton
Writer: D.W. Griffith, Geoffrey Moss (novel)
External Links: Wikipedia Rotten Tomatoes IMDb Language: N/A Country: USA
Plot: The story follows a Polish professor and his family who have become refugees in the aftermath of World War I. They try to survive in Germany during the period of the Great Inflation. Carol Dempster is Inga, a Polish war orphan who struggles to provide for the family that has taken her in, while accumulating a meager dowry from the rubble of depression-stricken Berlin so that she can marry Paul. Returning to his family, weakened by the battlefront's poisonous gases, Paul invests in his and Inga's future by tending a secret garden which he hopes will provide the resources for them to live, and which serves as a symbol of optimism for the two young lovers.
Rotten Tomatoes: Producer/director D.W. Griffith's feature is a fairly realistic study of the deprivations visited on the German people after their defeat in World War I. In her best-ever performance, Griffith protégée Carol Dempster plays Inga, who does her best to hold her family together and keep food on the table despite grinding poverty, debilitating illness and out-of-control inflation. The most memorable scene finds Inga desperately trying to maneuver a basketful of near-worthless Deutschmarks to a market before the prices rise again and she is unable to buy meat. Aware that anti-German sentiment still prevailed in the US, Griffith cannily inserted an opening title which noted that the main characters were Polish. A further title explains that "The Story is laid in Germany only because the conditions there were most suitable to show the struggle of love over hardship." Filmed on location in Germany, Isn't Life Wonderful sentimentalizes things just a tad towards the end, but otherwise remains an uncompromising forerunner of the semi-documentary European "street" dramas of the late 1920s and early 1930s. Alas, the film failed completely at the box office, ending D.W. Griffith's career as an independent producer (he would continue to direct, but only as a "hired hand" for various studios).
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74% (1) One Exciting Night 128 min, [Mystery] [D.W. Griffith] [02 Oct 1922]Ratings & Reviews: IMDb Reviews: 74%, External Reviews
Actors: Carol Dempster, Henry Hull, Morgan Wallace, Porter Strong
Writer: D.W. Griffith (story)
External Links: Wikipedia IMDb Language: N/A Country: USA
Plot: A young orphan girl, courted by an unpleasant older wealthy man who has a hold over her adoptive mother, falls in love with a young stranger at a party. Odd noises begin to be heard as a group of bootleggers clandestinely try to get away with their hidden loot. One of them is killed and the young man is suspected of being the killer.
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74% (1) The Sorrows of Satan 90 min, PASSED, [Drama, Romance] [D.W. Griffith] [12 Oct 1926]Ratings & Reviews: IMDb Reviews: 74%, External Reviews
Actors: Adolphe Menjou, Carol Dempster, Lya De Putti, Ricardo Cortez
Writer: Marie Corelli (novel), John Russell (adaptation), Forrest Halsey (screenplay), Julian Johnson (titles)
External Links: Wikipedia Rotten Tomatoes IMDb Language: English Country: USA
Plot: Geoffrey, a young and impoverished writer, is desperately in love with Mavis, who lives at his boardinghouse and is also pursuing a writing career. Unable to marry her because of his poverty, in his anger he curses God for abandoning him. Soon Geoffrey meets Prince Lucio de Rimanez, a wealthy, urbane gentleman who informs Geoffrey that he has inherited a fortune, but that he must place himself in the Prince's hands in order to enjoy the fruits of his inheritance. What Geoffrey doesn't know is that Prince Lucio is actually Satan, who is using Geoffrey as an experiment to show God that he can corrupt anybody.
Rotten Tomatoes: When a struggling literary critic and a writer fall in love with each other, the writer is unable to deal with his rejection by publishers and the attendant poverty he is forced to live in. He decides to put an end to it all and Satan appears to him in a disguise, making him an offer which he accepts and which makes him a part of the upper crust of London society. When he discovers who he has been dealing with, he tries to recover his own life. A rather surreal and visually pleasing drama.
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68% (1) The Love Flower 70 min, [Drama] [D.W. Griffith] [22 Aug 1920]Ratings & Reviews: IMDb Reviews: 68%, External Reviews
Actors: Anders Randolf, Carol Dempster, George MacQuarrie, Richard Barthelmess
Writer: D.W. Griffith, Ralph Stock (story "The Black Beach")
External Links: Wikipedia Rotten Tomatoes IMDb Language: English Country: USA
Plot: A man murders his wife's lovers, escapes with his daughter to the South Pacific. A detective pursues him, joined by a young man who eventually falls in love with the daughter.
Rotten Tomatoes: Raised on a tropical isle, a young woman becomes romantically involved with an outsider, while the law chases down her father who's wanted for murder. This quieter, untypical D.W. Griffith drama was adapted from a short story and filmed partially on location on the Island of Nassau.
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59% (1) Sherlock Holmes 85 min, Not Rated, [Drama, Mystery] [Albert Parker] [07 Mar 1922]Ratings & Reviews: IMDb Reviews: 59%, External Reviews
Actors: Carol Dempster, Gustav von Seyffertitz, John Barrymore, Roland Young
Writer: Earle Browne, Arthur Conan Doyle (story), Marion Fairfax, William Gillette (play)
External Links: Wikipedia IMDb Language: English Country: USA
Plot: One of Barrymore's most prestigious early roles, this rarely seen film also presents screen debuts of William Powell and Roland Young. When a young prince is accused of a crime that could embroil him in international scandal, debonair super-sleuth Sherlock Holmes comes to his aid, and quickly discovers that behind the incident lurks a criminal mastermind eager to reduce Western civilization to anarchy.
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