Tag Archives: 1920s

God and Satan war over earth; to settle things, they wager on the soul of Faust, a learned and prayerful alchemist. During a plague, Faust despairs and burns his books after failing to stop death; Satan sends Mephisto to tempt Faust, first with insight into treating the plague and then with a day’s return to youth. Mephisto is clever, timing the end of this 24 hours as Faust embraces the beautiful Duchess of Parma. Faust trades his soul for youth. Some time later, he’s bored, and demands on Easter Sunday that Mephisto take him home. Faust promptly sees and falls in love with the beautiful Gretchen, whose liaison with him brings her dishonor. Is there redemption? Who wins the wager?
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Nolff, a tough Breton fisherman is happy: his wife has just given birth to a son, Michel. His only wish is to make him a fisherman like him. But when he becomes a man, Michel becomes a good-for-nothing who spends his time in taverns with his evil genius friend Gwenn la Taupe. The sea will be his judge.
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Charles Chauvel came to the forefront of Australian cinema after The Moth of Moonbi (1926), and followed up with Greenhide, his final silent film. It was on the set of Greenhide that Chauvel met his wife Elsie, who had the starring role. The story follows a girl who moves from a life of leisure in the city to rural Queensland, where she romanticises her way into the arms of the rough farm manager, ‘Greenhide Gavin’. A cattle-thieving plot also unfolds.
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Poor glazier Sam Bisbee has invented break-proof glass. He intends to show it off to a convention of automobile men. Due to a mixup his car is switched with another and his demonstration toss of a brick simply breaks the car’s windshield. On the way home he thinks a woman is trying to commit suicide and so prevents her. The woman is really Princess Lescaboura, who arrives in Bisbee’s home town looking for him.
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Molly Kelly wants to marry a millionaire. When she runs into Andy Charles, heir to a restaurant fortune, she jumps at the chance and marries him. Andy’s father if furious and disinherits them. Andy tries his hand at ditch digging to support his wife, but that doesn’t work out.
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This visually magnificent and poetic city symphony of Paris in the late 1920s earned Sauvage the admiration of Jean Renoir and Jean Vigo. Sauvage maps the metropolis through its street life, monuments, ports, and automobile traffic.
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Cullen has hired Tom to try and stop the robberies on his railroad. Knowing Cullen’s secretary Holt is tipping off the gang, Tom works undercover by posing as a highwayman. To help him bring in the gang he enlists the help of the hobo DeLuxe Harry.
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All of those handsome young men in their flying machines are billeted in a field next to the Widow Berthelot’s farmhouse in France. Her daughter Jeannine is curious about the young men fighting for England in World War I and their airplanes. Then one of the aviators is killed. His replacement is Captain Philip Blythe who can’t help but notice Jeannine. When he lands the first time, she is standing in the middle of his “runway.” She makes a more favorable impression when he sees her later by the lilacs. When all of the young men depart on a mission, Blythe promises to return.
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The Michigan Kid is a gambler in the backwoods of Alaska trying to make enough money to go back to his hometown and impress the girl he loves. His childhood rival for the girl happens to turn up at his casino, in trouble and doesn’t want his girl to find about it. You guessed it, the same girl!
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A young girl and her father are kicked out of their house by a cruel noblewoman, and the girl’s heart is broken when her sweetheart, the noblewoman’s son, won’t go to Paris with them. After becoming an opera star in Paris, the girl returns to her homeland and finds her romance with the nobleman rekindled.
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