Hell's House

This is a typically benign silent comedy/drama whose only distinction is that it is set among the skyscrapers of 1928 NYC. Either the location work is real (hard to beleive they'd take chances with the lives of stars) or the matte work is extraordinry for its day. Blondy and Swede are gruff best friends who build skyscrapers. Blondy gets sweet on a girl he saves from a falling beam, Sally, but when he is injured in an accident and temporarily crippled, he rejects her. Swede tries every desperate measure to get Blondy to fight back, to try to walk, even masquerading as stealing Sally away from him. It all comes right in the end. Oscar nomination for Screenplay

Billy Morrow (Ben Lyon), who comes from a wealthy family, is sailing to Europe with his father (Holbrook Blinn) on their yacht. Along for the ride is Mrs. Parr (Claire Eames) and her stepdaughter. Near the French coast, Billy discovers that Mrs. Parr wants to arrange a marriage between him and the girl, so he escapes and takes a lifeboat ashore.

This late-20s gangster movie features Carole Lombard as a young gal who agrees to marry a smooth-talking gangster in exchange for the mob man's pledge to arrange a big-time concert appearance for her violinist boyfriend. The only thing that can save the day for the mis-aligned lovers is a shootout between the cops and the gangland thugs. This film is notable because it is one of the early 'talkies," and uses the newly developing audio technology with abandon. In fact, most of the action takes place off screen and the characters tell the cameras just what's happened. This one's small on sets, big on dialog.

SAL OF SINGAPORE was nominated for an Oscar for achievement in Writing during the second year of the Academy Awards. The film, being a part-talkie, nearly disappared from view. However, a preservation print does exist at UCLA, although it is unavailable for public viewing, awaiting restoration.

WW1 espionage tale....

A penniless artist moves into an abandoned house, but is discovered by the daughter of its former owner.

A reporter gets the best story of her life when she goes under cover to take down the head of a crime syndicate.

A busload of passengers gets stranded in a snowstorm and take refuge in an abandoned church, where they run into a mysterious man who may be on the run from the law.

Western pardners Jeff and Cash find a baby boy in an otherwise deserted emigrants' camp, and clash over which is to be "father." They are still bitterly feuding years later when they own adjacent ranches. Bill, the foundling whom Cash has raised to young manhood, wants to end the feud and extends an olive branch toward Jeff, who now has a lovely daughter. But during a mining venture, the bitterness escalates. Is Bill to be set against his own adoptive father?