The Sorrows of Satan is a silent film

Silent film

A silent film is a film with no synchronized recorded sound, especially with no spoken dialogue. In silent films for entertainment the dialogue is transmitted through muted gestures, pantomime and title cards...

 by D. W. Griffith

D. W. Griffith

David Llewelyn Wark Griffith was a premier pioneering American film director. He is best known as the director of the controversial and groundbreaking 1915 film The Birth of a Nation and the subsequent film Intolerance .Griffith's film The Birth of a Nation made pioneering use of advanced camera...

 based on the novel The Sorrows of Satan

The Sorrows of Satan

The Sorrows of Satan is an 1895 faustian novel by Marie Corelli. It is widely regarded as one of the world's first bestsellers, partly due to an upheaval in the system British libraries used to purchase their books and partly due to its popular appeal...

by Marie Corelli

Marie Corelli

Marie Corelli was a British novelist. She enjoyed a period of great literary success from the publication of her first novel in 1886 until World War I. Corelli's novels sold more copies than the combined sales of popular contemporaries, including Arthur Conan Doyle, H. G...

. At this point in his career Griffith had given up his independent filmmaker status by joining Paramount Pictures

Paramount Pictures

Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film production and distribution company, located at 5555 Melrose Avenue in Hollywood. Founded in 1912 and currently owned by media conglomerate Viacom, it is America's oldest existing film studio; it is also the last major film studio still...

.

A previous version of Corelli's story had been filmed in England during World War I

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

. Reportedly Griffith did not want to do this project, but as his first Paramount assignment he was not given a choice. Remarkably, however, the film turned out to be one of Griffith's most fully realized works and its critical stock has risen considerably in the last several decades. This was Carol Dempster

Carol Dempster

Carol Dempster was an American film actress of the silent film era.-Biography:Born in Duluth, Minnesota, Dempster got her start in films as a protégé of legendary film director D.W. Griffith alongside other Griffith actresses of the mid-1910s Lillian and Dorothy Gish and Mae Marsh...

's final screen role.

Plot

Adolphe Menjou

Adolphe Menjou

Adolphe Jean Menjou was an American actor. His career spanned both silent films and talkies, appearing in such films as The Sheik, A Woman of Paris, Morocco, and A Star is Born...

 stars as Prince Lucio de Rimanez, who is in fact really Satan

Satan

Satan , "the opposer", is the title of various entities, both human and divine, who challenge the faith of humans in the Hebrew Bible...

 assuming a human form. When struggling writer Geoffrey Tempest (Ricardo Cortez

Ricardo Cortez

Jacob Krantz , known by his stage name Ricardo Cortez, was an American film actor who began his career during the silent era.-Life and career:...

) is moved to curse God for his misfortunes, Prince Lucio makes a sudden appearance, informing Tempest that he has inherited a fortune. The only proviso is that Tempest must place his fate entirely in the Prince's hands. As he ascends to the uppermost rungs of European society, Tempest is ordered by Lucio to marry Russia

Russia

Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

n Princess Olga, even though the writer still loves his sweetheart Mavis Claire. Eventually, Prince Lucio reveals his true identity, but not before Olga has committed suicide

Suicide

Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Suicide is often committed out of despair or attributed to some underlying mental disorder, such as depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, alcoholism, or drug abuse...

. After rejecting the Devil and all his false promises, Tempest lives happily ever after with Mavis.

Production

This movie, like Ben-Hur

Ben-Hur (1925 film)

Ben-Hur is a 1925 silent film directed by Fred Niblo. It was a blockbuster hit for newly merged Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. This was the second film based on the novel Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ by Lew Wallace...

, was released in a different edit in Europe. The American version of The Sorrows of Satan had Lya de Putti's character play a nightclub scene with enough attire to pass the censors. In the European version, Griffith shot the nightclub scene with de Putti bare breasted.

Cast

Actor	Role
Adolphe Menjou Adolphe Menjou Adolphe Jean Menjou was an American actor. His career spanned both silent films and talkies, appearing in such films as The Sheik, A Woman of Paris, Morocco, and A Star is Born...	Prince Lucio de Rimanez
Ricardo Cortez Ricardo Cortez Jacob Krantz , known by his stage name Ricardo Cortez, was an American film actor who began his career during the silent era.-Life and career:...	Geoffrey Tempest
Carol Dempster Carol Dempster Carol Dempster was an American film actress of the silent film era.-Biography:Born in Duluth, Minnesota, Dempster got her start in films as a protégé of legendary film director D.W. Griffith alongside other Griffith actresses of the mid-1910s Lillian and Dorothy Gish and Mae Marsh...	Mavis Claire
Lya de Putti Lya De Putti Lya De Putti was a Hungarian film actress of the silent era, noted for her portrayal of vamp characters.-Early life and career:...	Princess Olga
Ivan Lebedeff Ivan Lebedeff Ivan Lebedeff was a Russian film actor. He appeared in 66 films between 1926 and 1953.He was born in Ushpol , Lithuania, then part of the Russian Empire, on June 18, 1894, and died in Los Angeles, California, from a heart attack.He migrated to the United States in 1925 and in 1930 was recorded at...	Amiel