Volume II: Filmography

HER CONFESSION

December 12, 1915 (Sunday)

Length: 1 reel

Character: Drama, "A love tragedy"

Cast: Florence LaBadie (Flower), Carey L. Hastings (Her mother), Thomas A. Curran (Emerald Vinton), Kathryn Adams (Margaret Van Allen), Ernest C. Warde (Father Morey)

SYNOPSIS, Reel Life, December 4, 1915:

"An unknown girl, dying on a hard cot in a prison cell, whispers to her father confessor the story of her crime: 'It wasn't a year ago that I met him. We lived in the country - mother and I. Father was dead. Mother had always kept me so much to herself. We had few friends - and I never had a lover. Then he came. Mother never knew, from the first time I met him in the woods, where he was sketching. I was garlanded in flowers that day, and I was kneeling by the brook, looking at myself in the water. He told me I was beautiful and begged me to pose for him. At first I was afraid. But day after day, I went to him little by little, and I forgot to fear him - and he told me he loved me, and I - oh, I never can tell you how he wound himself about my heart! Then he went away. I waited for weeks - for months - but no word came. At last, to remain longer unwed would have meant disgrace to me and a broken heart for my mother. I went to seek him. I found him in the arms of another woman, who laughed at me and ordered him to turn me out into the streets. Not a word or look of love had he for me - only anger, because I was imperiling his ambitious plans. But I felt that if I could see him alone, all would yet be right. So that night I went back to him. He was sleeping. Suddenly the memory of the other woman came between him and me, and I picked up a strange knife lying on the table, thinking to kill him as he slept and so have him for my very own. But the knife slipped to the floor. I loved him - I would renounce him forever. I turned to go - and there, in the doorway, she stood. She spoke angrily, and he waked. He flung me aside, and I fell. The knife was beside me. I can't remember the rest - only, as he turned to drive me from him - it happened.' The girl's eyes closed. The priest stooped to catch the last, faint whisper: 'His child dies - with me. Father - can there be - forgiveness - for such as I?'"

REVIEW, The Moving Picture World, December 11, 1915:

"Florence LaBadie is featured in this production in which a young woman, sick and in prison, confesses to the chaplain the story of her former life, and how she had murdered her artist lover because he had ruined her life and then clung to another woman. The story has been given an effective production."

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