Black Magic

Considered to be lost.

Hardly one of French filmmaker Abel Gance's masterpieces, The Torture of Silence nevertheless has more dramatic and psychological value than your average romantic-triangle tale. Simply put, the film concerns a doctor, his wife, and his brother. The doctor, a specialist in pediatrics, has no time for his wife Marthe. She seeks solace in the arms of his brother. Unable to keep up the charade, Marthe attempts to shoot herself, but it is her lover who is mortally wounded.

A woman enters a nightclub and slowly begins to open herself up.

George Washington, commander of revolutionary American forces, ends a squabble among the colonies as to under which flag the Americans will fight the British by recommending a new flag for all the colonies. He asks Betsy Ross to design and create the first flag. Meanwhile, British officer Brandon has crossed enemy lines in order to visit secretly his wife, who boards in the same house as Betsy Ross. Ross helps Mrs. Brandon hide her husband, but then Washington himself discovers the hidden enemy and must decide whether love or the rules of war shall prevail.

This film from George Melies is sadly one that's only available in fragments. The film starts off with a title card stating that a drunk man has just thrown his family out a window. We see a couple of them landing on the ground and then we go back to the room where the drunk is now trying to kill himself.

Prospero and his daughter Miranda must take refuge on an enchanted island. There Prospero, who himself has magical powers, releases the spirit Ariel from a spell, and also meets the savage Caliban. Then Prospero uses his powers to create a tempest that shipwrecks some of the persons who caused his exile.

A young boy’s toys come to life through animation.

The innkeeper's daughter is in love, but her mother has already decided that she is going to be married to another man.

A young woman's peaceful existence is shattered when she is abducted by the crew of a boat of smugglers, who then also turn against their captain.

A destitute man ready to drown himself is rescued by a caring passing woman. Soon thereafter forgiven by his dying father, he inherits great wealth and becomes engaged to a society woman. When she only laughs at the poor on a slumming trip, he remembers his own past and the woman who saved him.

A woman imagines the revenge of a gypsy that she sent away. This piece is told in multiple scenes, in an increasingly artificial world, as the venue shifts from a realistic courtyard to a wild, stagebound prison in which various stage monsters appear.

Griffith intercuts between the lives of two couples married on the same day. One couple is rich, the other poor. Time passes, and in desperation over joblessness, the poor husband attempts to burgle a home, only to be captured at gunpoint by the mistress of the house. It is the home of the rich couple. While holding the poor intruder at gunpoint, the rich wife accidentally discovers evidence implicating her own husband in a bribery scheme.

A mother (Renee Carl) goes to see a palm reader who informs her that a loved one is about to die. The woman doesn't know if it's her son or her husband (Rene Navarre) but history buffs will know who it is as it's April 10, 1912 and the husband is about to board the Titanic.

Set in a tenement, a lonely confirmed bachelor occupies a room across the hall from a dour spinster. Children run amok in the hallways playing pranks on the two. A little girl from the floor above, now alone in the world, brings the pair together and brightens their lives.

Georges Méliès's first attempt at Cinderella was in 1899. That film was extraordinary then for having multiple scenes and a semblance of a narrative; additionally, the use of dissolves as transitions in it influenced other filmmakers for years to do the same. Méliès was the cinema world's preeminent leader then. By 1912, however, that was no longer the case; frankly, as evidenced by this feature, his style had become dated. Moreover, Méliès had begun to adopt techniques from other filmmakers, such as direct cuts instead of dissolves, and there's even a match on action shot during the slipper trying-on scene.

In this latter day Cain and Abel story, a jealous brother strikes down his sibling just as a young burglar is about to enter the house. The jealous brother summons police, who then charge the intruder with murder.

At the age of 14 Joris Ivens was fond of Cowboys and Indians stories, so he decided to invent one himself. He made a script and used a camera from his father's shop. This became his first film, Wigwam, with his own family as cast. Black Eagle, a bad Indian, kidnaps the daughter of a farmer's family. Flaming Arrow, played by the young director, saves the child from the kidnapper and brings her back to her family. No better conclusion than smoking a peace pipe. Although filmed in the spring of 1912, the film had a theatrical release in December 1915.

Menelaus is the king of Sparta and temporarily departs from his residence, leaving Helen, the queen of Sparta, without him. When Paris of Troy, ambassador and son of the king, arrives in Sparta, he kidnaps Helen and brings her to Troy where the two fall in love. The Greeks attempt to siege the city walls of Troy, but fail. The Greeks then place a huge wooden Trojan horse with Greek warriors hidden inside under the walls of Troy, pretending to be dedicated to the gods and ending the war. Falling for the trap, the Trojans break down the city walls to bring the wooden horse inside.

This early film made by Georges Hatot for the Lumière Company is a brief single shot-scene of the assassination of the French revolutionary writer, Jean-Paul Marat--who has the notorious distinction of having influenced the Reign of Terror.

Based on Shakespeare's play, Act V, Scene vii: King John is in torment, and his supporters fear that his end is near. As he writhes in agony, he is attended by Prince Henry, the Earl of Pembroke, and Robert Bigot. Prince Henry tries repeatedly to comfort his delirious father, but to no avail - John's pain is too great.