Silent Exploitation Double Feature: Street of Forgotten Women (Silent) / The Road to Ruin (Silent)

In the Jazz Age, Hollywood was rocked by several scandals: the death of matinee idol Wallace Reid after a long battle with drug addiction, the sexual assault and death of aspiring starlet Virginia Rappe (attributed to Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle), and the (still) unsolved murder of director William Desmond Taylor. To combat widespread accusations that Tinseltown had become a hotbed of sin, a number of pictures were made that showed the dangers of sex, drugs, and vice. Despite their producers' noble aspirations, they usually ended up exploiting the very subjects they sought to condemn.

THE STREET OF FORGOTTEN WOMEN(1927): Grace Fleming wants to break into show business, but her father, a wealthy slum lord, forbids it. Seduced by a sleazy agent, she gets a job at a low-class cabaret dancing in a skimpy costume. Grace does not realize that she has actually been drafted into a prostitution ring. Soon, the poor girl is selling herself on the same broken-down streets her father owns.

Not much is known about The Street of Forgotten Women, other than that it was made to warn young girls about how easy it is to become a prostitute. Press materials of the era state that it is the dramatized true story of star Grace Fleming (though this may have simply been a screen name for an anonymous actress) and was "heartily endorsed by leading citizens, city officials, and the clergy as a motion picture that should be seen by all young women." The police shut down at least one theater for showing the film in Kansas, however.

THE ROAD TO RUIN (1928): Neglected by her stuffy parents, 16-year-old Sally Canfield starts experimenting with drugs, alcohol, and sex with older men. Her mother and father disown her after she is arrested in her underwear at a strip poker game. Discovering she is pregnant, Sally submits to a back alley abortion that has tragic consequences.

The Road to Ruin was popular enough to warrant a sound remake in 1934, also starring Helen Foster. In his book Behind the Mask of Innocence, film historian Kevin Brownlow reports that Foster kept a bottle of bootleg whiskey by her side to keep herself inebriated during the strip poker scene.

• silent