The Little American (1917)

Set during WWI but before the U.S. entered the war. A young American girl (Mary Pickford) is in love with a German (Jack Holt). Naively thinking the Germans will leave her alone since she is a neutral American, she leaves for France to visit her aunt but the ship she is sailing on is sunk by a German submarine. It's only the beginning of her realizing the brutality of war. Produced and co-directed by Cecil B. DeMille along with Joseph Levering. A very well done piece of war propaganda and one of Mary Pickford's more adult films. She's no Little Annie Rooney or Pollyanna here and she is the victim of a graphic attempted rape while trying to protect other women from being raped (she's unsuccessful). The main problem I had with the movie is how she easily she overlooks her lover's participation in the German brutalities although the film makes an attempt to redeem him toward the ridiculous finale. The film's visual highpoint is the sinking of the passenger liner which echoes THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE. The transfer I saw had an excellent if perhaps too insistent score by Adam Chavez. With Raymond Hatton and Hobart Bosworth.