The Whispering Chorus (DVD)

John Tremble has embezzled from his employer and flees to the woods in a panic to escape an audit. He discovers a corpse floating in a remote pond, and decides to exchange identification with the dead man, in order to fake his own death. His loyal "widow," Jane, is left penniless to fend for herself, while John rides the rails to another state to start over. Jane works her way up to prominence, eventually marrying the governor. While, in a weird twist of fate, police detectives follow the trail of evidence left on a corpse for several years, and then arrest John Tremble for his own murder!

Cecil B. DeMille's The Whispering Chorus was considered a ground breaking psychological drama upon its release, noted for its use of multiple exposures to depict a character's battle with conscience. Often overlooked are Raymond Hatton's roles in DeMille silent classics such as Male and Female (1919) and this powerful performance delivered a year earlier as the tortured soul in The Whispering Chorus. The sound era would cast him as the perennial comic sidekick to western stars Bob Livingston and Johnny Mack Brown. Hatton will always be best remembered riding alongside Tim McCoy and Buck Jones in The Three Mesquiteers series.

• silent