Directed by Lois Weber • 1916 • United States
Starring Mary MacLaren, Harry Griffith, Mattie Witting
Decades before the artistic triumph of neorealism and the cultural revolution of the feminist movement, director Lois Weber expressed the seeds of both in what is perhaps her greatest work: an almost documentary-like look at the everyday struggles of an ordinary young woman. Eva Meyer (sixteen-year-old Mary MacLaren, in a revelatory performance) is a poor shop girl working at a five-and-dime. Each week, Eva returns to her cold-water flat and dutifully hands over her meager earnings to her mother. But her wages barely cover the grocer’s bill and cannot provide for decent clothing. With only cardboard to patch the holes in the soles of her shoes, Eva’s life becomes harder with each rainy day and every splinter. In constant pain and with no solution in sight, the disheartened girl resorts to desperate measures.
Up Next in Directed by Lois Weber
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The Blot
Directed by Lois Weber • 1921 • United States
Starring Claire Windsor, Louis Calhern, Philip HubbardThe last film made under the banner of Lois Weber Productions, this moral drama, also written by Weber, is a biting commentary on economic inequality. Through her portrait of the Griggs family—an...
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Suspense
Directed by Lois Weber and Phillips Smalley • 1913 • United States
Starring Lois Weber, Val Paul, Douglas GerrardLois Weber stars as a young mother who is home alone when a tramp enters the house in this visually captivating and stylistically inventive thriller, featuring a striking chase scene...
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Discontent
Directed by Lois Weber and Allen G. Siegler • 1916 • United States
Starring J. Edwin Brown, Charles Hammond, Katherine GriffithDirector Lois Weber also provided the script for this short family drama, which follows a discontented Civil War veteran who leaves the home for aging soldiers where he...
