(imdb)
THE
AVENGING CONSCIOUS or THOU SHALT NOT KILL-1914-A man (Henry B.
Walthall) is raised by his uncle. When he's an adult (and Edgar Allan
Poe fan), he works for the old man (Spottiswoode Aitken). All goes
well until he meets a young woman Anabel (Blanche Sweet). He spends
more time with her than uncle would like. When the uncle insults her,
nephew quits. At a party, they meet “the stranger” (Ralph Lewis).
When the nephew realizes that as long as his uncle is around, he and
the girl can never be happy, he plots to kill uncle.
Unfortunately,
for him “the Italian” (George Siegman) sees him murdering unk and
blackmails him. Nephew walls up the corpse in the fireplace. His
guilt gets the best of him and he sees his uncle's ghost and has a
breakdown. He goes to a sanitarium and seems to be cured but he
suspects the stranger to be a detective (he's right) and hires the
Italian to keep an eye out. Later, while being questioned by the
detective, he has a fiery vision of demons in hell. He goes insane at
the sight of his uncle's ghost and reenacts the murder in front of
the detective. He flees but is pursued by a posse and hangs himself. The
girl commits suicide but….
This DW Griffith directed adaptation
based on Edgar Allan Poe's “The Tell Tale Heart” is sometimes
called the first great American horror movie. The ending might be a
letdown to some. It also features the ill-fated Wallace Reid as a
doctor.
Thanks for reading!
(imdb)
