Best Drama Movies of 1922

Amid big-budget medieval pageantry, King Richard goes on the Crusades leaving his brother Prince John as regent, who promptly emerges as a cruel, grasping, treacherous tyrant. Apprised of England's peril by message from his lady-love Marian, the dashing Earl of Huntingdon endangers his life and honor by returning to oppose John, but finds himself and his friends outlawed, with Marian apparently dead. Enter Robin Hood, acrobatic champion of the oppressed, laboring to set things right through swashbuckling feats and cliffhanging perils!

A young woman marries an older millionaire and then falls in love with a handsome nobleman on her honeymoon.

A charming pastoral about two unwanted children finding acceptance and love, Timothys Quest (1922) is a rare, cinematic gem based on a novel by Kate Douglas Wiggin (Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm), who was then known as Americas best loved author of stories about children.

Juan is the son of a poor widow in Seville. Against his mother's wishes he pursues a career as toreador. He rapidly gains national prominence, and takes his childhood sweetheart Carmen as his bride. He meets the Marquis' daughter Doña Sol and finds himself in the awkward position of being in love with two women, which threatens the stability of his family and his position in society. He finds interesting parallels in the life of the infamous bandit Plumitas when they eventually meet by chance.

Drama about the unhappily married Alexandra who hopes to recover from tuberculosis in a mountain resort, but instead meets the multimillionaire Edgar Buchanan.

This 1922 Frank Borzage film is a masterwork waiting to be rediscovered. Hester Bevins is a simple country girl who yearns for adventure. Though she has a handsome young man, Jerry, who is devoted to her, she leaves her village and goes to New York in search of a grander life. There she becomes the lover of a wealthy and unscrupulous businessman. But when Jerry returns blinded and dying from the war, Hester must choose between her new life and the man whose loyalty to her has never failed.

PEG O MY HEART (Metro Studios, 1922), directed by King Vidor, under the supervision of J. Hartley Manners, introduces the legendary theatrical actress Laurette Taylor (1884-1946) to the screen reprising the role she made famous as a poor Irish farm girl who inherits a fortune but would rather have happiness instead. While a bit too old for the character supposedly in her late teens or early twenties, Laurette was tailor made for it.

A film adaptation of the classic Alexandre Dumas novel. Edmond Dantes is falsely accused by those jealous of his good fortune, and is sentenced to spend the rest of his life in the notorious island prison, Chateau d'If. While imprisoned, he meets the Abbe Faria, a fellow prisoner whom everyone believes to be mad. The Abbe tells Edmond of a fantastic treasure hidden away on a tiny island, that only he knows the location of...

Wealthy Elias Graves builds his home on the top of a hill, where a group of squatters have taken up residence at the bottom. Many of the men in the squatters' village have their eyes on young Tess, and one of them, Ben Letts, frames Tess's father for murder. While maintaining her father's innocence, Tess must keep her love for Graves' son a secret, while caring for Elias' daughter's illegitamate child.

A group of New York society folk on a yachting excursion are forced to put into a New England fishing village for repairs. The engaged couple Reggie and Patricia are taken with the quaint town and its quainter ways, but also with two locals, Betty Alden and her brother John. Patricia begins to fall for John while her fiancé takes a seemingly unworthy liking to Betty. The new infatuations lead to disharmony.

A kingdom's ascending heir, marked for assassination, switches identities with a lookalike, who takes his place at the coronation. When the real king is kidnapped, his followers try to find him, while the stand-in falls in love with the king's intended bride, the beautiful Princess Flavia.

In 17th-century England, an outlaw clan kidnaps a young girl, who grows up among them. The farm boy who met her just before the kidnapping eventually rescues her, and they fall in love.

Oliver's mother, a penniless outcast, died giving birth to him. As a young boy Oliver is brought up in a workhouse, later apprenticed to an uncaring undertaker, and eventually is taken in by a gang of thieves who befriend him for their own purposes. All the while, there are secrets from Oliver's family history waiting to come to light. Written by Snow Leopard

A young man raised in the American South discovers he is an Indian prince whose throne was taken by usurpers.

On the run from punishment for a crime committed by his brother, Bertie Cecil (alias Lewis Victor) joins the French Foreign Legion. In Algeria, he becomes the hated rival of his commander, Chateauroy, who despises Victor's breeding and also competes for the same woman. Victor is beloved of Cigarette, an Algerian camp follower, who saves his life, though he loves another.

In the Battle of Ma?ogoszcz Prince Jozef Odrowaz was seriously wounded . Miss Salomea Brynicka and his father risked their own lives giving him food and shelter.

Prudence Cole is an unsophisticated Quaker girl being raised by her two aunts. Prudence is flirted with by snobbish Henry Garrison, who actually disdains the girl for her lack of worldliness and savoir faire. When Henry and his friends try to embarrass her at a posh resort, Prudence turns the tables on them.

Discovering that her husband is a bigamist, Nan returns with her child to her Puget Sound logging town. She is treated as an outcast by all save Donald, her childhood sweetheart, the son of a millionaire....

Yen Sin, a humble Chinese, is washed ashore after a storm and finds himself an outsider in the deeply Christian fishing community of Urkey. Yen Sin elects to stay, despite his status as a despised 'heathen', only to reveal hypocrisy amid the self-righteous township.

The Black Death is ravaging Spain. As Camille Saint-Saëns's "Danse Macabre" plays on the soundtrack, a mix of animation and acted scenes tells the story of Youth and Love meeting one night. They dance, embrace, and kiss. As the night wears on, exuberant Death, a skeletal figure with a violin, pursues the couple. They try to elude him. Eventually, Love swoons. Youth is powerless to protect her. Is she doomed?

Story of the lives of the people in a small Quaker community and the adventures of a whaling ship.

A soldier inaccurately reported as dead returns home to his Spanish family’s estate in California, only to find his father deceased and his ancestral land in the hands of strangers.

A young girl is struck and seriously injured by a wealthy society matron's car. The woman brings the girl back to her house. Later, a hardened thief is told by the girl of a goblet, that could be the Holy Grail, which has healing powers and could help her. The thief, touched by her predicament, sets out to steal the goblet and bring it to her.

Mormons capture women for their wives in this silent anti-Mormon propaganda film featuring the original organ music.

A sweet-natured young Irish woman is courted by a romantic poet and a local country gentleman. Which man will she choose?

Sherlock Holmes is a master at solving the most impenetrable mysteries, but he has his work cut out for him on his latest case. Prince Alexis is accused of a theft that he insists he didn’t commit. The evidence is stacked against him, but Holmes’ trusted friend, Dr. Watson, vouches for the prince. As the famed detective investigates, he’s brought face to face with his most devious adversary yet — Professor Moriarty.

Mary Tudor falls in love with a new arrival to court, Charles Brandon. She convinces her brother King Henry VIII to make him his Captain of the Guard. Meanwhile, Henry is determined to marry her off to the aging King Louis XII of France as part of a peace agreement.

Fulta Fisher runs a boarding house catering to seamen passing through the port. A girl known as Anne of Austria has had many lovers amongst the sailors, but presently she's known to be the "property" of Salem Hardieker, a tough Bostonian. When Anne's eye drifts to a new potential lover, Hans the Dane, he spurns her, knowing she's Salem's girl. But hell hath no fury like a woman scorned....

As young men, the squire (Marshall) and the village blacksmith (Walling) are in love with the same woman (Boardman), whom the blacksmith marries. This angers the squire. Years later, the squire's son Anson (Yearsley) dares the blacksmith's son Johnnie (Hackathorne) to climb a tree, from which he falls and is crippled. As adults, Anson and the blacksmith's daughter Alice (Valli) fall in love, which angers the blacksmith, who chastises his daughter. The blacksmith's other son Bill (Butler) returns from college and is injured in a train accident. Anson steals $480 from a church fund which is currently in Alice's possession. Alice is struck by lightning. The blacksmith take Anson and the squire to church where they both repent.

A miner's happiness is destroyed when a rival steals his mine. He becomes obsessed with revenge, and plans a trap for the man who took his mine.

Mr. May wants his daughter Diana to marry into society. The man he wishes her to wed is a scientist, Dr. Dimitrius, but Diana is in love with an officer, Commander Cleeve.

A gypsy loves a married farmer who is blinded blowing up a tree.

A paralytic dominates his brother and wife until their child reforms him.

A family of Russian Jews living in New York struggles to survive, while the mother strives to better their lives, but she finds that most of her efforts costs more then they are worth.

Dorothy, a young girl, is seduced by her father's chauffeur. She gives birth to a child who is given to the chauffeur's wife. The chauffeur, on a drunken binge murders the child, unaware that the child is his own.

Leon de Severac is fed up with his daughter Jacqueline, who is constantly seducing men. Hoping to discourage her from her flirtatious behavior, he tells her the story of Zareda, an attractive fortune teller who is having an affair with Ivan de Maupin.

Lance Bellew ignores his wife, Betty, for his mistress, Naomi Templeton, but becomes so enraged when he finds Betty in the company of Jerry Woodruff that he shoots this family friend.

A romance about a dancer seeking love and fame from Paris cabarets to New York society.

The story is essentially the same as the popular Jane Cowl play, with Talmadge in the dual role of Kathleen and Moonyean. Kathleen, a young Irish woman, is in love with Kenneth Wayne but is prevented from marrying him by her guardian John Carteret. John is haunted by memories of his thwarted love for Kathleen's aunt, Moonyean.

The hunter becomes the hunted, an officer of the Royal Mounted, fleeing, fighting for his life. Guided to a secret valley in the frozen North by a hot-blooded French-Canadian beauty, with a secret of her own...

Belle Bennett stars in this pioneering paranormal silent film.

A fairly conventional romance of an American heiress, loved by boy back home, bedazzled by a glamorous prince in beautiful Italian surroundings.

About Omar Khayyam of Persia, the poet and mathematician, who wrote the Iranian first solar calendar circa A.D. 1073. His fiancé was forced to marry the shah, but she eventually escaped and, with help of grand Vazir, joined Omar Khayyam. Hollywood made a film based on the same story with Connell Wilde, the life and adventures of Omar Khayyam.

Because he believes that romance is dead, the city editor wants to can the "advice to the lovelorn" column. Rosalie Beckwith, the column's author, naturally disagrees with him. The editor suggests that she prove him wrong by seeing if she can find romance within a 40-mile radius of the city.

Marion Taylor is secretary to Edward Mallory, a wealth Wall Street businessman. She supports her invalid brother Tommy, who has been told by his doctors that he has to go to the mountains for his health. Marion doesn't have the money for that, but Mallory, who has made no secret of his intentions towards her, does. She resigns herself to submitting to his advances in order to get the money in order to keep her brother alive. However, circumstances arise in which she may possibly get the money without having to debase herself with her boss.

Innocent country boy Tom Logan is taken in by the scheming Barbara Kay, a city woman who knows Tom is set to inherit his fathers farm which sits on a rich coal field. Toms father sees through her plot and disinherits him when her marries Barbara. When Barbara tires of farm life, the ensuing events lead to death and misplaced guilt.

A decadent tale of drugs and the London underworld the cosseted daughter of a respectable businessman - in fact head of a cocaine racket - succumbs to the pleasures of drink and drugs. Vivid nightlife scenes recreate the interwar world of flappers and hedonists; the dapper club owner and seedy street dealers.

Gloria, the daughter in a wealthy family, has finally spent most of her father's money. She marries Tony, whose as much of a reckless spendthrift as she is, and they continue indulging themselves. Tony's wealthy grandfather Adam Patch dies, but to their surprise he leaves Tony nothing. The couple try their hands at actually working for a living, but they don't like it and return to their spendthrift ways. Something has to give, and it soon does.

Because Dan McDowell is unable to operate the new mechanized fire equipment, he is retired with a small pension; his son, Johnny, quits school to work in the fire department; and his old horse, Bullet, is sold to a dirt-hauler. Dan is charged with stealing Bullet and is jailed, but he is cleared in time to give valuable aid in a fire that traps Johnny's sweetheart, June Rutherford.