Lois Weber Films Ranked
Note: “The Ranks of the Auteurs” is a written series that traces notable people, studios, and series throughout film history and ranks their work. This is the fifteenth installment, featuring Lois Weber, who was born on June 13, 1879 in Allegheny City, Pennsylvania and died on November 13, 1939 in Hollywood, California.
The vast majority of Lois Weber’s work, sadly, has been lost to the ravages of time, with about 20 titles still surviving (and even fewer easily accessible, as we shall see). Unfortunately, this eradication of her some 135 directorial credits stands in stark comparison to the relative wealth of extant works by her male peers, such as D.W. Griffith. But make no mistake, Weber is no less important. Credited with strengthening cinematic language through what could now, retrospectively, be seen as an “auterist” approach, Weber nevertheless began her career in close collaboration with her husband, Phillips Smalley.
After leaving behind a pianist training, Weber took to the stage, where she met her future husband; the couple married in 1904. In 1908, she was hired by the American arm of Gaumont as a singer on an early sound film technology. Weber was then given her true start in the film industry by that other preeminent female filmmaking pioneer (indeed, the first female filmmaker) Alice Guy-Blaché. Weber became a screenwriter (something she would do for her own films and independently, especially as command of her own productions dried up), and by 1911, began directing shorts at Rex Motion Picture Company. Weber and Smalley often had co-directorial credit in the early years, while both acted and Weber typically received sole writing credit. Rex merged with Universal in 1912, and Weber and Smalley essentially led the subsidiary. As we shall see, Weber’s growing success allowed her to experiment and devote screen time to progressive causes she believed in, attracting controversy and censorship in the process.
Her time at the Bosworth Company, which her and Smalley moved to in 1914, allowed for some of this creative expression, most notably in HYPOCRITES. But they returned to Universal in 1915, where Weber became the studio’s highest-paid director the following year. She formed her own studio, Lois Weber Productions, in 1917, and continued to work through it for Universal until the end of 1918, when she entered into a deal with Famous-Players-Lasky (the Paramount predecessor) and made a number of films before her production company folded in 1921. This would eventually be the extent of Weber’s Hollywood power, with a few more films following (notably THE BLOT), but not box office success.
Weber and Smalley divorced in 1922, and she sporadically made films and worked as script doctor throughout the rest of the decade. She made one talkie, the lost WHITE HEAT (1934), and was married to a military man, Harry Gantz, from 1926 to 1935. She died in relative obscurity, never truly recognized for her pioneering technique and narrative subjects in her lifetime. And as mentioned, unfortunately her place is not truly solidified today, with relatively few examples to turn to. Nevertheless, I’ve examined the six most accessible today below.
#6 — WHERE ARE MY CHILDREN? (1916)
Despite being listed as a co-directorial effort with Smalley, Weber’s husband, WHERE ARE MY CHILDREN? and its message could only have been crafted by Weber and her evangelical brand of progressivism. Making a case for birth control while uneasily equating eugenics and abortion (flirting with the former, outright denouncing the latter), WHERE ARE MY CHILDREN? is one of the most complicated works in Weber’s legacy. However, her sheer determination and frank commentary on the issues cannot be understated, the film not just circumventing the social mores of 1916 but completely smashing them. It’s a theme with Weber. Its questionable ethos should not be completely celebrated today and her (and Smalley’s) manifesto is not quite so visually effective as Weber’s other films, but it’s certainly an important part of the medium’s potential effect on audiences.
#5 — TOO WISE WIVES (1921)
Another display of feminism that may read as antiquated, TOO WISE WIVES is otherwise an effective melodrama about unhappy marriages and past loves. The concept takes on a bit more weight considering Weber and Smalley would divorce the next year (although there’s no reason to claim that Weber felt about a married man as the character of Sara does in the film).
#4 — SUSPENSE (1913)
Perhaps Weber’s single most famous film for the image of its innovative use of splitscreen, SUSPENSE was also co-directed by Smalley and is similar in spirit to Griffith thrillers like THE LONEDALE OPERATOR (1911). Nevertheless, SUSPENSE leaves them in the dust, taking the ahead-of-its-time phone-based plot (admittedly, something Griffith did as well) and intercutting the aforementioned three way splitscreen and sharp close ups. Clocking in at only ten minutes, SUSPENSE certainly lives up to its name, never dragging and serving a number of the most accessible looks at Weber’s innovation.
#3 — SENSATION SEEKERS (1927)
Available only in an abridged form, SENSATION SEEKERS is another “moralizing” tale that probably already seemed out of date in 1927, much like the films of Cecil B. DeMille (although nowhere near as bankable). Fitting, then, that he would come to produce one of Weber’s last films, the lost THE ANGEL OF BROADWAY (1927). DeMille was almost certainly influenced by Weber’s social message films, which reached their zenith and nadir with SENSATION SEEKERS. A rowdy flapper (Billie Dove) comes to love a reverend, although their union is forbidden by the respectable folk. When Dove’s “Egypt” runs back to the world she knew, she almost dies from drowning after her jazzy boyfriend’s ship goes down in a convincing marine storm scene. SENSATION SEEKERS is not so radical a film as her early work, but Weber updated her style to the slickness of then-modern Hollywood, if slipping backwards into trite territory. Still, the movie is a worthwhile, well-crafted work.
#2 — THE BLOT (1921)
Considered by many to be Weber’s best film, THE BLOT is certainly her most technically accomplished film. The message too, commenting on the nature of wealth and the need to sustain education and educators, was not as stale as those found in projects to come. THE BLOT was filmed on location and used natural lighting as much as possible, something appreciated less when watching a degraded print. It’s a testament to the film’s acuity, however, that it still shines through in particular moments. THE BLOT is probably Weber’s most “complete” film, her most thorough feature and the apotheosis of her legend.
#1 — HYPOCRITES (1915)
Nevertheless, HYPOCRITES, as a feature just over the classification line at a 49 minute run time, outshines THE BLOT. A pointed criticism of the excesses and, well, hypocrisy of organized religion, HYPOCRITES was actually Weber’s most radical, and therefore controversial, film. She consistently returns to the motif of the naked truth, symbolized by a nude, double-exposed, ghostly woman. This nudity caused trouble, sure, but was eventually protected on religious grounds (the film was released in January, just a month before the Supreme Court case Mutual Film Corporation v. Industrial Commission of Ohio ruled that the First Amendment did not extend to motion pictures). Leading man Courtenay Foote plays dual roles as men of God in the medieval and modern era, respectively. The medieval scenes are beautifully realized, and the modern are more biting for their obviously greater relevance. SUSPENSE is the technical exhibition and THE BLOT is the full-fledged, polished production, but HYPOCRITES is the moral and emotional center of Weber’s work.
