The Inner Circle

J. Jiquel Lanoe is a rich Italian, with a nice house and Mary Pickford for a daughter. A secret organization sends a note that unless he puts $1000 under the rose bush in his front yard, both are at risk. He goes to the police, and they put a guard on their house. While they are pursuing another man, Adolph Lestina sneaks onto the property and lights a bomb under the house. Little does he know that his own daughter, who was struck by a speeding car, has been carried into the house, where its occupants are comforting her.

We're talking about La Cosa Nostra, the Black Hand, the Mafia... whatever you choose to call it. Because these movies were popular among the poor Italian emigrants, the organization had to be given a false name.... but everyone knew what they were talking about.

Lanoe was a member of Griffith's stock company, almost invariably in bit parts. This was a rare opportunity for him to take a larger role. Although little of his work survives, he was a painter, who had been in Tahiti in the 1890s, where he may have met Gaugin. A few of his surviving canvases show Gaugin's influence.

A melodrama. The "inner circle" is merely a phrase used by a society for promoting the payment of money, funds to be left under some rose bush or other at a time designated by the inner circle. The climax of this picture comes just before a dynamite bomb explodes. It is a picture that is good in little things. It also has a well-made plot, but the explosion didn't get over. This was because there wasn't enough explosive material in the bomb. The producer wanted to have it go off almost as soon as it left the hands of the villain who has become a hero, and didn't dare make it dangerous. The best way is not to have any powder in the fused bomb and to explode a cartridge at the right time and in a safe place by electricity. When that is done one feels that the bomb was real. The picture's strength comes from good acting. Mary Pickford has the chief lady's part; but the interest centers in one of the gang and his child. - The Moving Picture World, August 24, 1912