No Academy Award this year — the formula crowns:
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Dir. Victor Sjöström · Victor Sjöström · Edith Erastoff · John Ekman · Nils Aréhn
A stranger comes to work at widow Halla's farm. Halla and the stranger fall in love, but when he is revealed as Eyvind, an escaped thief forced into crime by his family's starvation, they flee and become two of the many outlaws of Iceland's mountains.
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Dir. Ernst Lubitsch · Ossi Oswalda · Curt Goetz · Ferry Sikla · Margarete Kupfer
A teenage tomboy, tired of being bossed around by her strict guardian, impersonates a man so she can have more fun. She quickly discovers that being the opposite sex isn’t as easy as she had hoped for. What ensues is a gender-bending comedy decades ahead of its time.
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Dir. Marshall Neilan · Mary Pickford · Ida Waterman · Herbert Standing · Conway Tearle
Stella Maris is a beautiful, crippled girl, who is cared for by a rich family. They shield her from the harsh realities of the world, so that she has no idea of the cruel things that some people do. Unity Blake is a poor orphan all too familiar with the harsh realities of the real world. These two young women both fall in love with John, love which is complicated by the fact that he is still married to (though separated from) a bad wife.
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Dir. Maurice Tourneur · Tula Belle · Robin Macdougall · Edwin E. Reed · Emma Lowry
Peasant children Mytyl and Tyltyl are led on a magical quest for the fabulous Blue Bird of Happiness by the fairy Berylune. On their journey, they're accompanied by the anthropomorphized presences of a Dog, a Cat, Light, Fire, and Bread, among other entities.
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Dir. D.W. Griffith · Lillian Gish · Robert Harron · Dorothy Gish · Adolph Lestina
A group of youngsters grow up and love in a peaceful French village. But war intrudes and peace is shattered. The German army invades and occupies village, bringing both destruction and torture. The young people of the village resist, some successfully, others tragically, until French troops retake the town.
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Dir. James Young · Mabel Normand · George Nichols · Wheeler Oakman · Minta Durfee
Mickey, an orphan who has been brought up in a mining settlement, is sent to New York to live with her aunt.
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Dir. Scott Sidney · Elmo Lincoln · Enid Markey · Gordon Griffith · True Boardman
A female ape takes to mothering the orphaned boy (Tarzan) and raises him over the course of many years until a rescue mission is finally launched and the search party combs the jungle for the long-time missing Lord Greystoke. But then, one of the search members, Jane Porter, gets separated from the group and comes face to face with fearsome wild animals. Tarzan saves her from harm just in the knick of time and love begins to blossom.
How scoring works: films are ranked by a composite of a weighted (Bayesian) IMDb rating — the same method as the IMDb Top 250, so a high score from few voters can't outrank a strong score from many — blended with TMDB. Box office is a tiebreaker and a badge, never part of the score. Raw IMDb ratings and vote counts are shown on each card.