The Witching Hour (1921 film)

The Witching Hour is a 1921 American silent drama film directed by William Desmond Taylor and written by Julia Crawford Ivers, adapting the 1907 stage play by Augustus E. Thomas. The film stars Elliott Dexter, Winter Hall, Ruth Renick, Robert Cain, A. Edward Sutherland, Mary Alden, and F. A. Turner. The film was released on April 10, 1921, by Paramount Pictures.[2][3]

The Witching Hour
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Directed byWilliam Desmond Taylor
Produced byJesse L. Lasky
Screenplay byJulia Crawford Ivers(screenplay)
Augustus E. Thomas(stage play)[1]
StarringElliott Dexter
Winter Hall
Ruth Renick
Robert Cain
A. Edward Sutherland
Mary Alden
F. A. Turner
CinematographyJames Van Trees
Production
company
Distributed byParamount Pictures
Release date
  • April 10, 1921 (1921-04-10)
Running time
82 minutes[1]
CountryUnited States
LanguageSilent (English intertitles)

This was one of three times that the 1907 stage play was adapted to film, and according to critic Christopher Workman, was "the least interesting of the three film adaptations". A print of this film currently exists in the Library of Congress.[1]

British-born actor A. Edward Sutherland starred in a number of silent films before moving to the United States where he became a director, working on such Hollywood films as Murders in the Zoo (1932), Beyond Tomorrow (1940) and The Invisible Woman (1940).[1]

Plot

Clay Whipple (Sutherland) is convicted of murdering the governor following an incident involving a cat's eye pin. Whipple is sentenced to death, but a mentalist named Psychic Jack (Dexter) believes he is innocent since Whipple had been hypnotized at the time of the murder. The psychic persuades the judge to grant the condemned man a retrial, and he sets out to uncover the identity of the real killer, during which time he manages to prevent a second murder from occurring.

Cast

Preservation status

The film still exists and is preserved at the Gosfilmofond Russian state and the Library of Congress.[4][5]

References
  1. Workman, Christopher; Howarth, Troy (2016). Tome of Terror: Horror Films of the Silent Era. Midnight Marquee Press. p. 244.ISBN 978-1936168-68-2.
  2. "The-Witching-Hour - Trailer - Cast - Showtimes - NYTimes.com". nytimes.com. Retrieved January 24, 2015.
  3. "The Witching Hour". afi.com. Retrieved January 24, 2015.
  4. The Library of Congress American Silent Feature Film Survival Catalog: The Witching Hour
  5. Catalog of Holdings The American Film Institute Collection and The United Artists Collection at The Library of Congress, p. 21, c.1978 by The American Film Institute
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