It's hard to say what might have happened if D.W. Griffith's bosses at Biograph had agreed to let him make features, instead of limiting him to three reels, as they did with this movie. With its strong story of lust, pride, anger and ultimate redemption, I think Griffith might have expanded it to encompass all the seven deadly sins. As it is, he produced a typically fine melodrama with strong outdoor photography.
Mae Marsh lives in the hills with her father, W. Christie Miller, and her crippled mother, Kate Bruce. Bobby Harron is sweet on her, but she likes to throw rocks at him, as well as the top-hatted and cloaked Henry B. Walthall who comes riding by one day. Walthall isn't taken aback. He gives her sauce, and talks her into coming down into the valley with her. While he is making arrangements, up comes Viola Dana, and they fight and cuddle. Miss Marsh realizes she has made a mistake, but can't go home. Instead she gets a job at a lunch room.
The copy recently posted on YouTube is from a complete 16mm print of great age. The story is quite obviously far more coy than the sort of stage melodrama that Griffith had doubtless toured in before getting into the movies, but a lot of the appurtenances are there. As one would expect for this period, the story-telling is brisk, the camera lingers only for the "beauty shots" of Miss Marsh in the open countryside -- and beautiful they are indeed -- and Griffith's star company fills out the group shots without any fuss -- if you look for them, you can spot Lillian Gish and Lionel Barrymore, but if you don't, they're just people standing where people would naturally stand, doing things that people would naturally do.
In the end, the survival of this three-reeler doesn't set new highs or lows for Griffith in this period. It's simply another fine work in a period when he was doing very fine work, and a pleasure for those of us who enjoy his work, warts and all.