Kate Bruce

John Bowers, the actor whose roller-coaster career and tragic death allegedly inspired the movie A Star is Born, heads the cast of 1927's Ragtime. Bowers plays Ted Mason, a tin-pan-alley songwriter who composes a love ballad dedicated to debutante Beth Barton (played by Bowers' real-life wife Marguerite de la Motte). Alas, before Mason can get the song published, the sheet music is stolen by ambitious vaudeville hoofer Goldie Martin (Rose Dione), who in turn gives it to her dancing partner-husband Slick Martin (Robert Ellis). When the song becomes a hit, Beth is banished from her high social circles for stirring up "disgraceful" publicity. But not to worry: Mason writes another song that puts Beth back in the good graces of her friends, whereupon the grateful heroine marries the hero on the spot. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Milton Sills and Doris Kenyon star in this drama, which was actually based on a novel, The Interpreter's House, by Struthers Burt. During "the Great War" (as World War I was known back then), Guilian Eyer (Sills) is blinded, and his nurse, Vida (Kenyon), wants to take care of him permanently. So she convinces him that she has been horribly disfigured to win his sympathy, and they marry. It turns out, however, that his sight can be restored and Vida believes he will never forgive her for the deception. She also discovers that before the war, he had been engaged to another woman, Leal Satori (May Allison), so she leaves, hoping to win him back on honest terms. Vida takes a position as companion to his mother (Kate Bruce), and it becomes clear to her that Leal is only interested in Eyre's money. Eyre's brother-in-law, Phillip (Paul Nicholson), commits suicide, and it is revealed that he embezzled so much money that it has depleted the family fortune. Leal dumps Eyre, and once he finally figures out who Vida really is, they are reunited. Sills and Kenyon were a real-life romantic couple; they would marry in 1927. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide

Too long by at least 3 reels, D. W. Griffith's The White Rose is nonetheless one of the best and most accomplished of the director's "pastoral" films. Mae Marsh plays a virginal young lass of modest means who pretends to be more worldly than she actually is. Aristocratic divinity student Ivor Novello, who feels he must learn more about life in order to be an effective minister, accepts Mae's pose at face value and has an affair with the girl. Tortured by guilt, Novello bids goodbye to Mae and returns home to his childhood sweetheart Carol Dempster. When Mae discovers she is pregnant, she is cast out by her family and neighbors. She is given comfort and shelter by a sympathetic black family, who look after her as she brings her child into the world. Confronted by evidence of his indiscretion, Novello, by now a respected clergyman, gives up his calling-and his fiancee-to do right by Mae. Meanwhile, Carol finds happiness in the arms of businessman Neil Hamilton. The White Rose represented something of a comeback for the extraordinarily gifted Mae Marsh, whose talents had previously been squandered in a series of cheap, unimportant vehicles. The script was by someone named Irene Sinclair-who, under scrutiny, turned out to be D. W. Griffith himself. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In spite of the fact that George V. Hobart's play was merely a trite and overdone story parading as a moralistic allegory, it made loads of money. When it was finally made into a film, it became even more preachy and self-important. Youth (Richard Barthelmess) meets Ambition (E.J. Ratcliffe) and leaves Love (Marjorie Daw), his mother, and his small-town roots for the big city. There, in his search for Experience (John Miltern), he meets Pleasure (Lilyan Tashman) and hangs out at the Primrose Path with the likes of Temptation (Nita Naldi) and Intoxication (Helen Ray). Back home, Youth's mother dies, and Love tries unsuccessfully to reach him. When Youth's money runs out his newfound friends all leave him and he sinks into a life of drug addiction, aided by Habit (Agnes Marc). As he is about to rob the home of Wealth (Charles Stevenson), he hears a church choir and comes to his senses. Accompanied by Experience he returns home, where he starts life over again with Love. Thankfully, allegories -- which were very popular in the 1910s -- pretty much had died out by the early '20s. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide

"I'm not a bad businessman", filmmaker D.W. Griffith once protested, "Honestly I'm not!" Yet industryites were certain that Griffith had taken leave of his financial senses when he paid $175,000 for the screen rights to the old Lottie Blair Parker stage play Way Down East. Considered out of date even in 1920, the play told the story of Anna (Lillian Gish), the efficient yet secretive serving girl for a large farm family. Anna falls in love with David Bartlett (Richard Barthelmess), the family's son, but feels unworthy of him due to her checkered past. It seems that, years earlier, Anna had been duped into a sham marriage by city slicker Lenox Sanderson (Lowell Sherman). When she became pregnant, Sandson walked out on her. Shortly afterwards, her newborn child died, and Anna was shunned by her home community. These facts come to surface when Sanderson returns to Anna's life as the local squire. David's prudish father orders Anna out of the house and into a blinding snowstorm, but David, after settling accounts with the duplicitious Sanderson, goes after Anna and claims her as his bride. In adapting Way Down East for the screen, Griffith fleshes out the characters of Anna and Sanderson by adding a prologue, which included one of those poignant scenes ever filmed: Anna's tearful insistence that her dying baby be baptized. He also injected the weary old property with a jolt of sheer showmanship, added a "last minute rescue" sequences wherein Anna, lying exhausted on an ice floe, is rescued by David seconds before plunging over a precipitous waterfall. Even today's audiences, armed with the foreknowledge that Lillian Gish enjoyed 73 hale and hearty years after the completion of Way Down East, invariably gasp in fright and urge Richard Barthelmess to "hurry! hurry!"during the climactic scene. Far from becoming Griffith's Folly as predicted, Way Down East was a huge moneymaker. There is no better of Griffith's artistry than the fact that the 1930 talkie remake of Way Down East, though directed by the formidable Henry King, failed to match the pathos and power of the 1920 version. Our own quibble: why did Griffith retain so much of the original play's wheezy comedy relief, and why did he put that relief in the hands of the relentlessly unfunny Creighton Hale? ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Even though this is a lesser D.W. Griffith film, the casting is intriguing. Richard Barthelmess, who usually played a "good boy," portrays Dan McGuire, a lazy beachcomber who likes his gin. The girl is Clarine Seymour, whose spirit was far earthier than Lillian Gish's, and whose talent was far more spontaneous than Carol Demptser, the star of most of Griffith's later films. Unfortunately, Seymour died later in the year (1920) at the age of 21, so her talent was never fully realized. The real problem with this film was its South Seas setting, which was very foreign territory for Griffith, since his brand of sentiment just didn't mix with primitive backgrounds. On this particular South Seas island lives Mary (Seymour) a dancing girl who has a French father and Javanese mother. Two men come along who vie for her heart: McGuire, the drunken bum, and Walter Kincaid (Creighton Hale), the invalid nephew of an island missionary (George MacQuarrie) who has come to the tropics for his health. Natives from a nearby island attack, and the nephew is heroically and conveniently killed. Mary confesses that she loves McGuire, who promises to reform. She, in turn, agrees to become civilized and which brings them together for the fade out. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide

Since much of this film takes place in rural Kentucky, where director D.W. Griffith grew up, it no doubt has many autobiographical touches. Since the setting was so close to his heart, that may be why this simple and winsome picture is one of Griffith's most charming creations. With complete lack of pretension, it tells the story of John Logan Jr. (Robert Harron), an ambitious young inventor who is determined to be a success. So he heads for the big city to achieve his dream of making a toy frog that actually swims. Not that he hasn't had opposition -- his sweetheart, Jennie Timberlake (Lillian Gish, in a rare showing of her comic ability) and his parents (George Fawcett and Kate Bruce) have done everything they could to make him stay. Although he promises to return in a year's time, John gets caught up in the temptations of the city, including a flirtation with a spirited young lady (Carol Dempster in her first credited role). Eight years pass, and finally after much struggle, John's frog becomes a resounding success. He returns home to Happy Valley just in time -- his father is facing financial ruin and is desperate enough to commit robbery. John's presence saves the family, and he and Jennie are reunited. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide

True Heart Susie is one of D.W. Griffith's "pastoral" films, wherein plot takes second place to characterization and romance. Lillian Gish plays Susie May Trueheart, who so loves local boy William Jenkins (Robert Harron) that she secretly finances his education. Returning to his home town as a minister, Jenkins never catches on that Susie is crazy for him. While Our Heroine pines away, Jenkins marries The Wrong Woman, young temptress Betty Hopkins (Clarine Seymour). Betty begins indulging in affairs with other men, but Susie loyally keeps this information from the reverend Jenkins. Even when Betty dies of pneumonia, Susie refuses to reveal all she's done on Jenkins' behalf. Finally, Susie's Aunt (Kate Bruce) can stand no more: she tells Jenkins the whole story, whereupon he takes Susie in his arms and pledges eternal devotion. In the hands of a lesser director, True Heart Susie might have been impossibly maudlin (and unbelievable; after all, can anyone be as much of a blockhead as Reverend Jenkins seems to be?) As it stands, the film's dramatic and heart-tugging value has not diminished, not even after the passage of nearly eighty years. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In the sentimental world of filmmaker D.W. Griffith, the greatest thing in life is love. Obtaining it and understanding it, however, isn't so easy, as Jeanette Peret (Lillian Gish) learns. While working in her father's Greenwich Village cigar store, she meets an attractive but arrogant Southern youth, Edward Livingston (Robert Harron). She and her father (Adolphe Lestina) visit their country of origin, France, but unbeknownst to Jeanette, Edward has paid for the trip. While in France, Jeanette meets and marries an earthy and rather plodding grocer, Monsieur le Bebe (David Butler). The first World War begins, and both Jeanette's husband and Edward wind up enlisting. In battle, the insolent young Edward learns a lot about humanity while Monsieur le Bebe is killed. Edward returns from the war a changed man and finally finds a permanent place in Jeanette's heart. When The Greatest Thing in Life was released, much ado was made over a new photographic effect used in the film -- the soft-focus close-up. Also, notably, there is a touching scene between Harron's character and an African-American soldier. The soldier saves Edward's life, but is mortally wounded. When the dying man calls out for his mother, Edward pretends to be his mother, cradling him in his arms and even giving him a kiss. This is quite a difference in attitude toward blacks compared to The Birth of a Nation. Griffith was not a racist, he was merely a product of his Southern background. The Greatest Thing in Life, along with Griffith's other Artcraft-distributed features (there were seven), was underappreciated in its time. Other films from this period of Griffith's career (such as A Romance of Happy Valley) have grown in stature. Unfortunately, it is doubtful that the true value of The Greatest Thing in Life will ever be realized, as it remains a lost film. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide

Sometime during the shooting of the landmark The Birth of a Nation, filmmaker D.W. Griffith probably wondered how he could top himself. In 1916, he showed how, with the awesome Intolerance. The film began humbly enough as a medium-budget feature entitled The Mother and the Law, wherein the lives of a poor but happily married couple are disrupted by the misguided interference of a "social reform" group. A series of unfortunate circumstances culminates in the husband's being sentenced to the gallows, a fate averted by a nick-of-time rescue engineered by his wife. In the wake of the protests attending the racist content of The Birth of a Nation, Griffith wanted to demonstrate the dangers of intolerance. The Mother and the Law filled the bill to some extent, but it just wasn't "big" enough to suit his purposes. Thus, using The Mother and the Law as merely the base of the film, Griffith added three more plotlines and expanded his cinematic thesis to epic proportions. The four separate stories of Intolerance are symbolically linked by Lillian Gish as the Woman Who Rocks the Cradle ("uniter of the here and hereafter"). The "Modern Story" is essentially The Mother and the Law; the "French Story" details the persecution of the Huguenots by Catherine de Medici (Josephine Crowell); the "Biblical Story" relates the last days of Jesus Christ (Howard Gaye); and the "Babylonian Story" concerns the defeat of King Belshazzar (Alfred Paget) by the hordes of Cyrus the Persian (George Siegmann).

Rather than being related chronologically, the four stories are told in parallel fashion, slowly at first, and then with increasing rapidity. The action in the film's final two reels leaps back and forth in time between Babylon, Calvary, 15th century France, and contemporary California. Described by one historian as "the only film fugue," Intolerance baffled many filmgoers of 1916 -- and, indeed, it is still an exhausting, overwhelming experience, even for audiences accustomed to the split-second cutting and multilayered montage sequences popularized by Sergei Eisenstein, Orson Welles, Jean-Luc Godard, Joel Schumacher, and MTV. On a pure entertainment level, the Babylonian sequences are the most effective, played out against one of the largest, most elaborate exterior sets ever built for a single film. The most memorable character in this sequence is "The Mountain Girl," played by star on the rise Constance Talmadge; when the Babylonian scenes were re-released as a separate feature in 1919, Talmadge's tragic death scene was altered to accommodate a happily-ever-after denouement. Other superb performances are delivered by Mae Marsh and Robert Harron in the Modern Story, and by Eugene Pallette and Margery Wilson in the French Story. Remarkably sophisticated in some scenes, appallingly naïve in others, Intolerance is a mixed bag dramatically, but one cannot deny that it is also a work of cinematic genius. The film did poorly upon its first release, not so much because its continuity was difficult to follow as because it preached a gospel of tolerance and pacifism to a nation preparing to enter World War I. Currently available prints of Intolerance run anywhere from 178 to 208 minutes; while it may be rough sledding at times, it remains essential viewing for any serious student of film technique. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Dorothy Gish was seen at her light-comedy best in the Fine Arts production Susan Rocks the Boat. Gish plays the title character, a wealthy young woman with no discernible purpose in life and a propensity for getting into trouble. Inspired by the exploits of her role model, Joan of Arc, Susan decides to open a mission in the tenement district. Fortunately, our heroine does not carry her idolatry so far that she ends up being burned at the stake. Instead, she meets and marries Larry O'Neill (Owen Moore), the idealistic son of a slum politician. A melodrama finale, in which Larry is shot by a disgruntled office seeker and nursed back to health by Susan, was the only truly sombre touch in this otherwise chucklesome five-reeler. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Dorothy Gish stars as Gretchen, the daughter of Dutch immigrant Ralph Lewis. Doing her best to adjust to her strange new homeland of the USA, Gretchen falls in love with Italian-American Frank Bennett. The plot thickens when she is kidnapped by gangsters so that her father, an engraver, will be forced to make counterfeit plates. A rousing (and amusing) rescue scene caps this cinemadaptation of Bernard McConville's story Gretchen Blunders In. Curiously, the film is not mentioned in the otherwise thorough 1973 coffee-table book Lillian and Dorothy Gish. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide