Broken Laws

Broken Laws
Directed by	Roy William Neill
Produced by	Dorothy Davenport; Thomas H. Ince
Written by	Marion Jackson; Bradley King
Based on	the short story, Broken Laws; by Adela Rogers St. Johns
Production; company	Thomas Ince Corporation
Distributed by	Film Booking Office of America
Release date	November 9, 1924;
Running time	70 min.
Country	United States
Language	English

Broken Laws (1924) is an American silent dramatic film directed by Roy William Neill, remarkable for the appearance of Dorothy Davenport, who is billed as "Mrs. Wallace Reid".

Plot

Joan Allen (Davenport) is a loving mother who can't help indulging her son Bobby, spoiling him to the point where he is an irresponsible "jazz-mad" teenager on trial for vehicular manslaughter. She wakes up with a start at the end of the trial, with new resolve to provide the right amount of parental discipline.

Production background

Davenport's husband was the star Wallace Reid, who died of morphine addiction in January 1923. By June 1923, Davenport had co-produced, starred in and toured the country with Human Wreckage, a moralistic warning about the terrors of drug addiction. The film's sensational tone, and the roadshow engagement with her personal appearances, were a direct precursor to the later 1930s exploitation films of Kroger Babb and others.

Broken Laws on the topic of parental overindulgence is the second of Davenport's "social conscience" releases, followed by The Red Kimona (1925), based on a true-life story of white slavery.[1]

Cast

Dorothy Davenport as Joan Allen (credited as "Mrs. Wallace Reid")
Percy Marmont as Richard Heath
Ramsey Wallace as Ralph Allen
Jackie Saunders as Muriel Heath (as Jacqueline Saunders)
Arthur Rankin as Bobby Allen at 16
Virginia Lee Corbin as Patsy Heath at age 16
Tommy Hicks as Fat kid
Henry Neill as Himself

Preservation status

According to the SilentEra website, a print exists in the Cinematheque Royale de Belgique.

gollark: Can you recommend a different way to keep the weird vector-of-node thing?

gollark: <@337621533369303042> I guess you want that then if you *must* be C++y and evil.

gollark: I don't actually want to do this, but I mean check which subtype a node is.

gollark: Is there some way to switch over subtypes or whatever?

gollark: ADTs? ADTs ADTs. ADTs ADTs ADTs, ADTs ADTs!

References

Guide to the silent years of American cinema, by Donald W. McCaffrey, Christopher P. Jacobs, page 101

External links

This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.

[1] Guide to the silent years of American cinema, by Donald W. McCaffrey, Christopher P. Jacobs, page 101