The Cheat 1915
A venal, spoiled stockbroker's wife impulsively embezzles $10,000 from the charity she chairs and desperately turns to a Burmese ivory trader to replace the stolen money.
A venal, spoiled stockbroker's wife impulsively embezzles $10,000 from the charity she chairs and desperately turns to a Burmese ivory trader to replace the stolen money.
Despite her well-bred upbringing, Mary had disobeyed her family’s wishes and married Steve Denby, a petty thief whose penchant for booze has left them destitute. Mary answers an ad to be a society woman’s seamstress and is hired by Mrs. Hillary. Mr. Hillary is trying to close a deal with Roger Manning and entices him by inviting him, as a dinner guest, to meet the “prettiest girl in the world.” Upon learning that the “prettiest girl” is indisposed, Mrs. Hillary, realizing that Mary had good upbringing, enlists Mary as a substitute. Naturally Mary and Manning fall in love, and, since the deal still isn’t signed, the Hillary’s hire Mary’s services for the weekend.
Hot-blooded gypsy Carmen attempts to seduce Don Jose, a lawman sent to thwart a gang of illegal smugglers in Spain. Carmen's plan backfires when Don Jose's passion for the gypsy girl escalates into a jealous rage as she spurns him for her bullfighter beau, Escamillo, with tragic results.
When a young girl is placed under hypnotism, it's discovered that she has a split personality.
Sato (Sessue Hayakawa) faithfully works for importer James Thornton (James Neill). When the old man dies, he leaves his daughter Mildred (Vivian Martin) in Sato's care. Sato loves the girl, but as he is Japanese he cannot hope to ever marry her (at least not in the racially prejudiced era of the early 1900s). Besides, Mildred loves Harry Maxwell (Tom Forman), who was raised alongside her.
Carmen, a maid, steals a locket belonging to the Aragon princess Maria Theresa and sells it to Gaines, a New York art collector, not knowing that the locket contains the clue to the Aragon family fortune's whereabouts. Based on the 1909 Broadway play of the same name by Paul Dickey and Charles W. Goddard.
Two young clerks in a department store meet and fall in love during a seaside vacation in Maine, but part as strangers because, unknown to each other, both had been masquerading as upper-class 'swells', just to see how the better half lives.
Blamed for the theft of an orphans fund, Captain James Wynnegate flees to the West where he makes a new life with the Indian woman Nat-U-Rich.
Nora is nursemaid to a wealthy family and in love with their chauffeur Nolan. When she hides her mistress' lover in her room, jealous Nolan shoots him and Nora, who refuses to tell about her mistress affair, is dismissed.
Melaine is captured by a northern soldier while she is carrying secret southern messages. She falls into the hands of her father's former superior who attempts to compromise her. She is saved by a successful Confederate attack.
Lewis Vickers accidentally kills a man and goes to Central America. Here he meets Robert Lee, who bears a remarkable resemblance to him. Lee is a worthless young chap whose father is anxious to have him return to the United States. On his death bed Lee turns his papers over to Vickers and begs him to assume his name. Arriving in New York, Vickers goes to the Lee home as Robert Lee, and discovers that the dead man has willed him a badly blotted past that includes a wife and two children and a large collection of debts. He also finds a beautiful adopted daughter in the Lee household and promptly falls in love with her. The only way he can stand any chance of winning the girl is by telling the truth about himself.
A good-natured but chivalrous cowboy romances the local schoolmarm and leads the posse that brings a gang of rustlers, which includes his best friend, to justice.
Set during the Balkan Wars, The Captive tells the story of Sonia, a young woman living in Montenegro and left to care for her younger brother Milos and the family farm when older brother Marko goes off to battle. Unable to handle the day-to-day tasks following her brother’s tragic death, help comes in the form of Mahmud Hassan, a captured Turk nobleman, now a prisoner of war. Tasked with helping Sonia, their initial frosty relationship soon melts into love. As the war rages on Sonia, Mahmud and Milos will face near-insurmountable obstacles in their quest for a better life amidst the hell of war.
Despite her love for penniless Dirck Mead, Lorraine marries wealthy Aaron Roth to save her family from financial ruin.
Helen Ainsworth, a young philanthropist, who is interested in a prison reform movement, is engaged to Norman Morris, administrator of the Ainsworth millions and the undiscovered "man higher up," grafting through his influence with prison wardens. He is also having an "affair" with Felice, Helen's maid, an ex-convict.
Fishermaid Marcia Manot finds an emerald which once belonged to a Norse queen and is cursed. Greedy American Silas Martin marries her, then sets her up for divorce. She kills him and weds his business manager Sterling, but a detective learns about Silas' death.
This silent melodrama is set against the 1840s westward migration of the Mormons. Dora, a young woman, and her family are saved from an Indian attack by a Mormon community traveling to Utah. They join the wagon train. Dora is pursued by two men, one a recent convert, the other a scheming elder with a stable of wives. The Mormon elder wants her in his harem. When the mother kills herself from revulsion toward polygamy, the daughter must consider her own future and the man she loves. One of Mae Murray's few surviving films, this was intended by Robert Leonard to be a thoughtful drama about the goods and evils of Mormonism, but today it is generally considered pure anti-Mormon propaganda.
Justus Graves (Theodore Roberts) is a mean-spirited human being, so it's no surprise that when he returns home from a business trip, he finds his wife Elsie (Kathlyn Williams) in the arms of another man (J.W. Johnston). Graves shoots and wounds the man, then hides with his little daughter in Mexico.
In the office of Major Northfield, the quartermaster of the Pacific Coast, a leak has been discovered which may endanger the safety of American transports that are secretly carrying troops across the Pacific. Nara-Nara, a Japanese detective, is assigned to the case because his country has guaranteed safety to these transport ships. Nara-Nara believes that Northfield is guilty, although in reality it is Northfield's secretary Kitty Little, a girl of German ancestry, who is passing information to Dr. Ebell Smith, a German agent. Nara-Nara falls in love with Kitty, but soon after discovers that she is the leak in the quartermaster's office.