Silent Western Double Feature: Salomy Jane (1914) / Six Feet Four (1918) (DVD)

The discovery of gold draws men from all over the country to California. One old prospector makes the mistake of bringing his beautiful daughter, Salomy Jane, with him. Lusted after by the lonely miners, she is soon attacked by the deranged Red Pete. Salomy is saved by the mysterious Jack Dart, who kills her assailant in the struggle. Dart is captured by the authorities and sentenced to be lynched for Pete's murder. But Salomy will risk everything to prevent him from being hanged, for she has fallen in love with her saviour.

Based on a novella by Bret Harte, Salomy Jane is the only surviving work of Beatriz Michelena, America's first Latina movie star. Originally a stage actress and opera singer, the Venezuelan-American beauty became involved in film through her husband, automobile dealer George Middleton. The California Motion Picture Company was formed in 1912 to shoot promotional footage of the cars he was selling. Convinced that his gorgeous wife could compete with Mary Pickford (Beatriz even cut her hair in a similar manner), Middleton financed a adaptation of the Harte story to showcase her talents. British expatriate actor House Peters was borrowed from Paramount to co-star. A critical success, several more Beatriz Michelena pictures would follow, all paid for by her husband's car dealership. These included Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch (1914), The Lily of Poverty Flat (1915) and The Woman Who Dared (1916). The couple began to run into trouble when their lavish production of Faust (1917) went drastically over budget; Beatriz's career came to a premature end shortly thereafter. A 1931 fire at a storage facility destroyed almost all of Beatriz's work, forcing her legacy into obscurity. Recently, however, her status as a trailblazer for Hispanic actresses has come to be appreciated. In 2002, President George W. Bush praised her during a speech to commemorate National Hispanic Heritage Month.

BONUS: Six Feet Four (BW, 1919, SILENT): Buck Thornton saunters into Dry Gulch and is immediately arrested for matching the description of a man who recently burglarized the local hotel. Though able to clear his name, Buck again falls under suspicion when pretty Winifred Waverly is robbed. Learning that the actual thief is the town sheriff, Buck challenges the two-timer to a duel that only one of them will walk away from. This rare Western is directed by the prolific Henry King, an Academy Award winner for The Song of Bernadette (1943). Starring William Russell.

• silent