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OPEN CLASSIC CINEMA · 395

Way Down East

1920148 minUnited States
Drama

Synopsis

A young woman is deceived into a false marriage and abandoned after becoming pregnant. Following the loss of her child, she finds work with a rural family and attracts the son's affection. The return of the man who betrayed her threatens that fragile refuge, exposing a community quicker to condemn her than to question his respectability.

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Video edition
Wikimedia Commons
Original language
No spoken dialogue. Intertitles: not identified.
This copy runs
147:58
Subtitles
No subtitle track in this language

No spoken dialogue. Intertitles: not identified. No subtitle track in this language.

Languages and subtitles

No subtitle track in this language

Wikimedia Commons · D. W. Griffith; YouTube · Public domain

Cast

DirectorsD. W. Griffith

Inspirations

D. W. Griffith expanded Lottie Blair Parker's stage melodrama into a film remembered for its rescue on a freezing river. Lillian Gish's performance connects the physical ordeal to the story's criticism of unequal moral judgment.

Sources and availability

General references identify the work and its copy. A reference beside an editorial section is linked to the claims checked in that section.

Wikipedia — film referenceDuke Center for the Study of the Public Domain — US term reference

Work catalogued as public domain in the United States.

The public-domain references concern the original films in the United States. Rights can differ for other countries, editions, restorations, music or translations. Sources are listed on each film page.

Availability checked on September 12, 2026.

Photograph credit

Photographs cropped, resized and optimized as WebP, displayed in monochrome.

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