A 1921 fever dream where a $25 check becomes $2,500 and morality evaporates like bathtub gin.
Robert Frazer and Anna Q. Nilsson star in this drama, based on Temple Dusk by Calvin Johnson. David Marlowe (Frazer), the son of a clergyman (Frank Currier), is seduced by the earthly delights of drinking and gambling. While intoxicated he proposes to Ember Edwards (Nilsson), and she accepts because he has told her he is rich and she is sick of her poverty-stricken life. At a gambling house run by Clement Palter (Charles Lane), David takes a 25 dollar check from Bunny Fish (Robert Schable), changes the amount to 2,500 dollars, and proceeds to lose the whole sum at faro.
Acting
Nilsson's eyes do everything the intertitles can't.
Production
Gambling den sets that scream 'we borrowed a theater backlot.'
Director
George D. Baker
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Released during Prohibition, this moral panic film secretly made drinking look way more fun than church. The Hays Code didn't exist yet—filmmakers could actually show vice without 47 disclaimers.
Anna Q. Nilsson was Swedish, couldn't really speak English, and still became one of silent Hollywood's biggest stars. Her face did the heavy lifting.
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