The Diabolic Tenant 1909
A man rents an apartment and furnishes it in remarkable fashion.
A man rents an apartment and furnishes it in remarkable fashion.
On a whim, a greedy tycoon decides to corner the world market in wheat. This doubles the price of bread, forcing grain producers into charity lines and others further into poverty. The film contrasts the differences between the lives of those who work to grow the wheat and the life of the man who dabbles in its sale for profit.
Roman emperor Nero is used to getting what he wants. He has grown tired of his wife Octavia, and has become infatuated with Poppea. He succeeds in making Poppea the new empress, but soon he faces opposition from an outraged populace. Informed of the danger of an imminent popular uprising, Nero orders to set fire to the city, which he watches from a terrace, rejoicing and playing his lyra.
A gang of thieves lure a man out of his home so that they can rob it and threaten his wife and children. The family barricade themselves in an interior room, but the criminals are well-equipped for breaking in. When the father finds out what is happening, he must race against time to get back home.
During the American Revolution, a young soldier carrying a crucial message to General Washington is spotted and pursued by a group of enemy soldiers. He takes refuge with a civilian family, but is soon detected. The family and their neighbors must then make plans to see that the important message gets through after all.
Mother in law gets a new set of dentures. Despite being initially happy, the family soon discovers the teeth have a life of their own and jump from their owner's mouth and bite everyone who comes near--from ladies to gentlemen to policemen.
While caring for his sick daughter, a doctor is called away to the sickbed of a neighbor. He finds the neighbor gravely ill, and ignores his wife's pleas to come home and care for his own daughter, who has taken a turn for the worse.
A pair of young ladies cause trouble at the cinema with their lavish hats.
The Count sets out to make a private room for him and his Countess, built in such a way no one can see, hear, and most importantly, disturb them. But unbeknownst to the Count, his wife has set her eyes on the court minstrel. Based on Edgar Allan Poe's “The Cask of Amontillado” and Honoré de Balzac's “La Grande Breteche”.
This might be termed a comedy of errors, for the overzealousness of a lot of good-hearted simple folks places them in a rather embarrassing position. Lillie Green, who keeps a boarding house, receives a letter from her old school chum, Polly Brown, whom sin hasn't seen in years, to the effect that as Lillie has never seen her little darling daughter, she will send her for a few days' visit, asking that someone meet the child at the 3:40 train. Lillie's boarders are a bunch of kind-hearted bachelors, who at once prepare to give the "Little Darling" the time of her life, buying a load of toys, etc., for her amusement, also procuring a baby carriage with which to meet her at the train. You may imagine their embarrassment when they find that Tootsie, instead of being a baby, proves to be a handsome young lady of seventeen, whose tastes run rather to garden gates, shady lanes and quiet nooks, than toys. (Moving Picture World)
Surviving fragment of a longer film. A magician makes a butterfly woman appear, and a woman in a star. Exhausted, the magician falls asleep and the star woman turns into a spider, dragging the butterfly into her web.
A music teacher is in love with Helen, one of his students, but she rejects him. In his hurt he joins an anarchist group who plan to blow up a rich capitalist's house. When he realizes it's Helen's house, he tries to stop the plan.
During the reign of Oliver Cromwell, Catholic worship is forbidden on pain of death. Three soldiers are arrested as Catholics and condemned to die. Cromwell decides to spare two of them and to determine which should die by chance. The guards bring the first child they meet. Whichever soldier she gives the 'death disc' to shall die. Cromwell is charmed by the girl and gives her his signet ring. By chance the child is the daughter of one of the soldiers and gives the death disc to her father, because she thinks it's pretty. The child is returned home to her mother, who learns of her husband's pending execution and of the power of the ring. She rushes to the place of execution and saves her husband by producing the ring.
A smoker falls asleep, and two mischievious fairies play with his pipe. He discovers this, and imprisons them in a cigar box. He removes a flower from the box, which contains a fairy smoking a cigarette. Next, he leaves briefly while his smoking paraphenalia clears itself from the table and the flower reassembles itself into a cigar. He lights the cigar, then breaks a bottle containing the fairy, who interacts with him in various ways reeling from his cigar smoke, building a bonfire that he extinguishes, etc.
A bored Lady Helen goes slumming as a domestic in a boarding house. There she falls in love with a sensitive young musician. The other women in the house are jealous, and accuse her of trying to steal the musician's violin. Lady Helen retreats to her own home, and arranges a position for the musician which allows them to be together.
In this hand-colored short, a magician and his assistant do a series of magic tricks, including making potted plants appear, among others. Melies played the magician, and the actor Manuel played his assistant.
As Poe's lover is slowly dying, he struggles to make money to care for her.
An Indian village is forced to leave its land by white settlers, and must make a long and weary journey to find a new home. The settlers make one young Indian woman stay behind. This woman is thus separated from her sweetheart, whose elderly father needs his help on the journey ahead
A disfigured young woman with two beautiful sisters is courted by a blind man. Will he still love her when his sight is restored?
Bob Spaulding, a manly fellow, meets Dr. Rankin and his wife on the street while they are engaged in a violent tiff. The doctor is about to strike his wife when Bob interferes, incurring the resentment of the doctor. During the flurry Mrs. Rankin drops her card case. From a card inside he learns the address and goes there to return it. They meet, and it is a case of love at first sight; but she is a wife, and beyond his reach.