The title feature for this collection, The Devil's Needle, chronicles the trauma of drug abuse as experienced by John Minturn, "an artist of the modern school, painting for profit's sake as well as for Art's." Played by Tully Marshall, the middle-aged artist hero is first seen waiting for his latest model, lazybones Renee, "a lady of considerable artistic temperament" enacted here by future silent star Norma Talmadge. She eventually shows up for her job, but the day is waylaid by other assorted complications including John's lawyer patron and the artist's quest for a new second model, which leads to squabbling with Renee that only increases when he decides to marry his patron's daughter (despite claims that he will never actually fall in love). Renee decides to win him by introducing him to her favorite pastime, shooting up with morphine. Not surprisingly, that plan doesn't go smoothly as his life is soon on a rollercoaster involving the police, a rural rehab stint, and a final act of atonement.
Running a tight 66 minutes and surviving in mostly good shape apart from a few fleeting moments of severe damage (including the almost complete obliteration of its closing seconds), 1916's The Devils Needle is most notable to film historians for its director, Chet Withey, a disciple of D.W. Griffith (who supervised this film); the only surviving version seen here is apparently a 1923 reissue print, with Talmadge upgraded to star billing and some tweaks made to the characters. The treatment of the story isn't as shocking as subsequent 1930s films by the like of Dwain Esper, but you do get to see a syringe in action here along with some not-terribly-subtle intimations about what "artist's models" get up to on the side. It's not hard to see why Talmadge became a box-office draw soon after, and she's easily the acting high point here; Marshall is adequate but seems a little too buttoned-down and gray to pass as a passionate, tormented artist.
A "drama in five parts" from the Edison Studios starring Viola Dana, Children of Eve from 1915 is the longest (at 74 minutes) and most mainstream of the three with a few pointed jabs that still resonate today. Case in point: a key newspaper headline reading "Capitalists get government protection. Why not little children?" Here we have a Dickensian story about the working conditions in slums, the exploitation of child labor, and the disinterest of the upper classes, all centered around a plot to send a "petite" female spy among the working children to expose their horrific working conditions. Complete with a large-scale factory fire sequence and a melodramatic, tragic ending, the film paints a fairly grim picture of its characters from a newborn to an elderly corrupt industrial owner; this is stern stuff for sure, pounding on its audience to get the message through.
On a similar note the third film in the set, The Inside of the White Slave Traffic, is more of a matter-of-fact short film (28 minutes) exposing the evils of enforced prostitution with a string of vignettes showing how the city streets can turn innocent daughters into repeat offenders and victims of unscrupulous criminal forces. Complete with a look at 1913 New Orleans and informative definitions of codes used by human traffickers ("Crying" = police, "Gillette Blade" = girl), this is once again a doom-laden look at the dark side of modern civilization. To add a note of authenticity, the film touts that it was "produced by Samuel H. London, the noted Sociologist, from facts gathered during his international investigation of the White Slave Traffic, in civic co-operation with the United States Department of Justice." Many of the scare tactics here (especially the horrific final shots) will look plenty familiar to anyone who's seen educational films warning against the dangers of drug use or illicit sexual activity, and it's fascinating to see these modes employed so early in the cinematic lexicon well before "scare films" as we know them today became a significant social force.
The disclaimer on the back of the packaging for both the Blu-Ray and DVD iterations of this release is definitely worth noting: "Derived from the only known surviving copies, some of the films presented here suffer significant wear and nitrate decomposition. This collection is a sobering reminder of the importance of film preservation." Generally speaking, these look quite good overall with the usual Kino practice of leaving the elements as untouched as possible. That means you'll see plenty of scratches and specks, but at least it still looks like film. The first feature has the nastiest stretches of damage, including the almost wholesale destruction of the final few seconds; however, it's a relief that these managed to survive at all given the sorry fates of many of their contemporaries. Extras included an untouched raw chunk of footage from the third feature (19 minutes), an 8-minute Children of Eve outtake that should make firebugs very happy, and liner notes by Richard Koscarski, who covers the production companies and major players behind each of the films and also explores the early days of social problem cinema.
For more information about The Devil's Needle, visit Kino Lorber. To order The Devil's Needle, go to TCM Shopping.
by Nathaniel Thompson
