Bessie Love

A 1930 mystery melodrama from RKO, directed by Christy Cabanne and based on the 1912 play by Robert B. Baker and John Emerson. Margaret Holt and her brother Victor investigate the narcotics ring responsible for their father's death, with the help of a crotchety crime author played by Ned Sparks, whose over-the-top performance steals the show. The film is a fascinating artifact of the early sound era, when actors and directors were still learning to adapt to the medium of talkies. Bessie Love and Hugh Trevor round out the cast. The film entered the public domain in the United States in 1958 because the copyright was never renewed.

Mystery · Crime · Drama

The first sound film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture, and MGM's first all-talking musical. Two sisters from the vaudeville act the Mahoney Sisters, Hank and Queenie, arrive in New York chasing a spot in a Broadway revue. Hank's sweetheart, the songwriter Eddie Kearns, promises them a break, but the plot turns on the oldest showbiz story there is: the man falls for the wrong sister. Bessie Love's performance as the self-sacrificing Hank earned an Oscar nomination. The film is creaky by modern standards, but its success proved that audiences would sit through a feature of synchronized song and dialogue, and it set off the Hollywood musical gold rush that defined the early sound era. Published in 1929, it entered the public domain in the United States on January 1, 2025.

Musical · Romance · Drama

An expedition led by the bombastic Professor Challenger ventures to a remote South American plateau where dinosaurs still roam. The film adapts Arthur Conan Doyle's novel and is most remembered today for Willis O'Brien's stop-motion animation, a direct ancestor of his work on King Kong (1933). The brontosaurus rampaging through London at the climax is the sequence everyone cites. Wallace Beery glowers his way through the lead, and the supporting cast includes Bessie Love and Lewis Stone. The effects were astonishing for 1925 and remain a key milestone in the history of visual effects. Published in 1925, it is in the public domain in the United States.

Adventure · Fantasy · Sci-Fi · Silent

A rough Bering Sea skipper rescues a young woman from a shipwreck and comes to regard her as a daughter, until a returning sweetheart and a rival sealing schooner test his hardened heart. Hobart Bosworth stars in this early Arctic adventure. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Adventure · Drama