The Cheat

The Cheat

13/12/1915 0h 59m 6.0/10

Overview

A venal, spoiled stockbroker's wife impulsively embezzles $10,000 from the charity she chairs and desperately turns to a Burmese ivory trader to replace the stolen money.

Director

Cecil B. DeMille

Top Billed Cast

Sessue Hayakawa

Sessue Hayakawa

Hishuru Tori [Haka Arakau]

Jack Dean

Jack Dean

Richard Hardy

Yutaka Abe

Tori's valet

James Neill

James Neill

Jones

Dana Ong

District attorney

Fannie Ward

Fannie Ward

Edith Hardy

Reviews

CinemaSerf

CinemaSerf

6/6/2022

6/10

Vaudevillian Fannie Ward made her cinematic debut here as "Edith", a rather shallow woman married to Jack Dean ("Richard"), a stockbroker. She lives for life's fripperies, and when he starts bemoaning the amounts of money she is frittering away on luxuries, she decides to procure some cash of her own by embezzling $10,000 from a charity she runs. Desperate to return the money, she turns to the distinctly shady Burmese ivory trader "Hishiru Tori" (Sessue Hayakawa) who offers her a deal - but at an horrible price... It has a very theatrical style to it, this production, but that's not a bad thing. It helps us to focus on the characters - with Ward, and particularly the sinister "Tori" - working well to create the atmospheric, shadowy - almost menacing, look of the film. The use of light and shade is also used to good effect for that purpose too, and although the ending runs a bit to melodrama, this story of avarice and repentance is certainly worth an hour of anyone's time.

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