Volume II: Filmography

MOTHER

September 6, 1910 (Tuesday)

Length: 975 feet

Character: Drama

Cast: Anna Rosemond, Frank Crane, Carey L. Hastings

ARTICLE, The Morning Telegraph, September 4, 1910:

"On Tuesday, September 6, the company releases Mother, a drama which will attract considerable attention. Those appearing to good advantage in the film are the Misses Rosemond and Hastings, as well as the leading man of the company, Frank Crane."

SYNOPSIS, The Moving Picture World, September 10, 1910:

"The play deals with Will Allen, a country lad, who is unhappy at home, owing to the fact that he is a studious little chap and prefers his books to farm work, which incurs the displeasure and enmity of his stepfather, a rough and surly farmer, to whom book learning does not appeal. Will runs away from home, and although his mother keeps a light in the window, hoping to guide her boy home, he never returns. Twenty years later, when the boy has made a place for himself in the world as a successful lawyer, he goes back to the farm, only to find that his little mother, who has been left a widow, has gone away, whither, no one knows.

"The mother, in the meantime, being left alone in the world, goes to the city and there supports herself by dressmaking. While shopping in a department store she is unjustly accused of shoplifting. The only person who believes in her innocence is a salesgirl, who is discharged for her presumption and daring to correct her superiors. The girl, in her efforts to help the friendless old lady, enlists the aid of Will, whom she knows to be a lawyer of great ability. Will is about to refuse the case, as the dry goods company is a client of his, when the girl describes the lonely old lady, and begs him for the sake of his mother to befriend her. Will consents. Will's clear statement of the case to the judge, together with May's testimony, frees the mother. When her counsel approaches to offer his congratulations, mutual recognition results."

REVIEW, The Moving Picture World, September 17, 1910:

"A little domestic tragedy which shows how boys are sometimes driven from home and what results from it. First, the unfortunate lad enlists one's sympathies in the beginning of the picture. The lonely mother, waiting for her son, holds them, and eventually the old woman unjustly accused of shoplifting works still stronger upon one's sympathies. Then comes the recognition and reunion after the long years of separation. It is a picture that goes direct to the heart and makes one put himself in the place of all the characters. Perhaps that magic word, mother, is the key to the whole situation."

REVIEW, The New York Dramatic Mirror, September 14, 1910:

"This is mild melodrama of conventional construction, but with an ending that appeals to the sympathies. A country boy runs away from home because his father wants less 'book learnin' and more work. After becoming a great city lawyer, the son returns to the old home only to find that the family has disappeared. One would think that he would have kept in communication with his mother if he loved her so much, but it appears he did not, and he is therefore in ignorance of the fact that she is now a widow living in the city as a dressmaker. A reunion is brought about by the arrest of the mother on a false charge of shoplifting and the appearance of the son in her behalf at the solicitation of his sweetheart, a salesgirl in the store, who braved the displeasure of the hard-hearted merchant and championed the cause of the dressmaker. The father is too violent in his abuse of the son in the early scenes, but the other parts are well taken."

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