Charles Bickford

Looks at the stereotype-breaking films of the period from 1929, when movies entered the sound era, until 1934 when the Hays Code virtually neutered film content. No longer portrayed as virgins or vamps, the liberated female of the pre-code films had dimensions. Good girls had lovers and babies and held down jobs, while the bad girls were cast in a sympathetic light. And they did it all without apology.

A naive traveler in Laredo gets involved in a poker game between the richest men in the area, jeopardizing all the money he has saved for the purpose of settling with his wife and child in San Antonio.

Della Chappell is a very wealthy and incredibly reclusive woman. When a big company wants to develop some land that Della owns, the town sends out Barney Stafford to talk to her. She invites Barney over to negotiate the proposal. Barney soon takes a liking to Della's equally reclusive daughter Jenny Chappell. After spending some time with Jenny, he realizes that Della has a dark secret, one that keeps them from the outside world.

An alcoholic falls in love with and gets married to a young woman, whom he systematically addicts to booze so they can share his "passion" together.

Young Swedish-American Katrin "Katie" Holstrom leaves her family farm in Minnesota, headed for nursing school. After her tuition money runs out, she is forced to take a job as a maid in the home of Congressman Glenn Morley. Holstrom endears herself to the genteel Morley, and begins to show a surprising aptitude for politics herself. She launches a campaign for Congress, and, as right-wing reactionaries plot against her, a romance develops.

The neighbors of a frontier family turn on them when it is suspected that their beloved adopted daughter was stolen from the Kiowa tribe.

Immigrant radical Bartolomeo Romagna is falsely condemned and executed for a payroll robbery. Years later, his son Mio sets out to find the truth of the crime and to bring to account the gangster Trock Estrella.

Pilot episode, directed by Dick Powell.

Retired wealthy sea captain Jim McKay arrives in the Old West, where he becomes embroiled in a feud between his future father-in-law, Major Terrill, and the rough and lawless Hannasseys over a valuable patch of land.

An alcoholic falls in love with and gets married to a young woman whom he systematically addicts to booze so they can share his "passion" together.