When Rosemary Thebey turns down wealthy L. Rogers Lytton's sordid advances, he has her fired from her job, then follows her. Fortunately, she seeks refuge with Leo Delaney, and soon they are married. Lytton, however, pursues his melodramatic vengeance by getting Delaney fired from every job, until Miss Thebey's sister, Zena Keefe, decides to wreak her own vengeance on her family's oppressor.
This movie, set in Italy, takes fine advantage of a number of melodramatic tropes. Ralph Ince directs it rather large, but it is a well edited three reels, including some cross-cutting for ironic commentary.
Doubtless part of the impulse to make this movie was the success of George Dillenback's novel. Another was the sizable number of Italian immigrants who made up a sizable portion of the motion picture audience. I suspect this had an influence on Ince's brother Thomas to produce a more sympathetic early feature, THE ITALIAN.
