John Francis Dillon

Directing

John Francis Dillon

Born — Died

1884-07-12 — 1934-04-04

Place of birth

New York City, New York, USA

Known for

Directing

Credits

52 titles

Known for

Careers poster
10.0

In French Indochina, a magistrate is assigned to investigate the murder of his boss. Unknown to him, the boss had a policy of requiring the wives of his subordinates to sleep with him if they wanted their husbands to get promoted. What he also didn't know was that his wife was in the boss' office when he was killed. Complications ensue.

Careers

1929

The Girl of the Golden West poster
10.0

A hard-bitten saloon girl falls for a dashing outlaw, and tries to keep the local sheriff from catching him and sending him to prison.

The Girl of the Golden West

1930

Lilies of the Field poster
7.0

A young mother, Mildred, doesn't know that her husband Walter is cheating on her. One night she attends a party with a friend of her husband's, and the man gets drunk and begins groping her when they get home. Her husband sees this and uses it as an excuse to sue his wife for divorce. In the ensuing trial he wins, due to fraudulent evidence, and gets custody of the child. Complications ensue.

Lilies of the Field

1924

Flaming Youth poster
3.8

When Mona Frentiss dies, she has her confidante "Doctor Bobs" watch over her family, especially her youngest daughter Patricia. The family has been raised in a most unconventional manner, with Mona having a much younger lover and the father Ralph keeping his own lover on the side. As Patricia grows older, she attracts the attention of her mother's former lover, the much older (than Patricia, who in the book is in her early to mid teens) Carey Scott. Patricia tempts fate with her wild ways, nearly loses her virtue to a musician aboard an ocean-going boat, and is saved in time by Carey. Realizing that he is the man for her, she settles down into an experimental marriage.

Flaming Youth

1923

Kismet poster
4.0

Hajj, a rascally beggar on the periphery of the court of Baghdad, schemes to marry his daughter to royalty and to win the heart of the queen of the castle himself. This film is believed lost.

Kismet

1930

The Plaything of Broadway poster
9.0

A beautiful young girl, Lola, is a dancer at a private club for wealthy men in New York City. Some of the club members make a bet that Lola can't seduce a young doctor, Jennings. Her attempt fails, and in order to find out why she follows him around and discovers that he runs a clinic on the city's poor Lower East Side. She begins to see the young doctor in a new light, and sets out to help him build the emergency hospital he's always wanted.

The Plaything of Broadway

1921

Film credits

1920s · 6 titles

1910s · 6 titles

Three Friends poster
5.0

Each night, after the day's work at the factory, the three bachelor friends met and declared anew their attachment over a social glass. They bound themselves to remain thus as long as life might last, never to marry. But one was a traitor, while the other two were called away. A widened breach, a quarrel, fanned the resentment, but true friendship at last claimed its own.

Three Friends

1913

Dough and Dynamite poster
6.1

Pierre and Jacques are working as waiters at a restaurant where the cooks go on strike. When the two are forced to work as bakers, the striking cooks put dynamite in the dough, with explosive results.

Dough and Dynamite

1914

Hobbled Hearts poster
NR

Hobbled Hearts comedy short

Hobbled Hearts

1917

The Key to Yesterday poster
NR

George Carter, a revolutionist in South America, is the exact double of Frederick Marston, a famous artist in Paris. Carter is betrayed by a comrade and is sentenced to be shot. He takes a desperate chance and escapes on board a vessel bound for London. In Paris Marston is stabbed by a model because he does not return her love. The wound incapacitates him from painting, and leaves an ugly scar, and he goes to America on a vacation. Highwaymen attack him, inflicting injuries which cause a total loss of memory. The robbers leave nothing in his pockets but the key to his Paris studio, and Marston adopts the name of Robert Anglo-Saxon.

The Key to Yesterday

1914

Burglar by Proxy poster
5.0

A terrible toothache causes Jack Robin to stop his automobile in front of the home of Dorothy Mason. Noticing a flat tire, Jack attaches his automatic pump and forgets about it as he listens enthralled to Dorothy's singing. When the sound of the burst tire brings Dorothy running out, Jack feigns injury so he can be nursed by her. After he leaves the house, and Dorothy's father discovers some important invention plans missing, Harlan Graves, Dorothy's suitor, suggests that Jack stole them. Jack, suspecting Graves, breaks into Graves' home to clear himself and meets a real burglar, "Spider" Kelly, who adopts Jack as his guide. They blow up a safe at a house party where Jack suspects the plans to be hidden. The papers are found, Graves is arrested and Spider, disappointed that Jack made such a mess in blowing the safe, goes off, leaving Dorothy and Jack happily alone.

Burglar by Proxy

1919

No artwork available
7.0

No synopsis available yet.

A Desert Honeymoon

1915

Behind the camera

Careers poster
10.0

In French Indochina, a magistrate is assigned to investigate the murder of his boss. Unknown to him, the boss had a policy of requiring the wives of his subordinates to sleep with him if they wanted their husbands to get promoted. What he also didn't know was that his wife was in the boss' office when he was killed. Complications ensue.

Careers

1929

The Girl of the Golden West poster
10.0

A hard-bitten saloon girl falls for a dashing outlaw, and tries to keep the local sheriff from catching him and sending him to prison.

The Girl of the Golden West

1930

Lilies of the Field poster
7.0

A young mother, Mildred, doesn't know that her husband Walter is cheating on her. One night she attends a party with a friend of her husband's, and the man gets drunk and begins groping her when they get home. Her husband sees this and uses it as an excuse to sue his wife for divorce. In the ensuing trial he wins, due to fraudulent evidence, and gets custody of the child. Complications ensue.

Lilies of the Field

1924

Flaming Youth poster
3.8

When Mona Frentiss dies, she has her confidante "Doctor Bobs" watch over her family, especially her youngest daughter Patricia. The family has been raised in a most unconventional manner, with Mona having a much younger lover and the father Ralph keeping his own lover on the side. As Patricia grows older, she attracts the attention of her mother's former lover, the much older (than Patricia, who in the book is in her early to mid teens) Carey Scott. Patricia tempts fate with her wild ways, nearly loses her virtue to a musician aboard an ocean-going boat, and is saved in time by Carey. Realizing that he is the man for her, she settles down into an experimental marriage.

Flaming Youth

1923

Kismet poster
4.0

Hajj, a rascally beggar on the periphery of the court of Baghdad, schemes to marry his daughter to royalty and to win the heart of the queen of the castle himself. This film is believed lost.

Kismet

1930

The Plaything of Broadway poster
9.0

A beautiful young girl, Lola, is a dancer at a private club for wealthy men in New York City. Some of the club members make a bet that Lola can't seduce a young doctor, Jennings. Her attempt fails, and in order to find out why she follows him around and discovers that he runs a clinic on the city's poor Lower East Side. She begins to see the young doctor in a new light, and sets out to help him build the emergency hospital he's always wanted.

The Plaything of Broadway

1921

The Pagan Lady poster
4.0

Dot starts out as a bartender in Havana when in walks Dingo Mike (Charles Bickford) and orders up a drink that sounds like something you'd consume on a dare. He drinks the concoction down in one swallow and also manages to outsmart Dot's boss and his rum-running hooligans. You see, Dingo is a bootlegger himself. He literally sweeps the lady off her feet and they set up housekeeping in a tropical hotel full of colorful characters, some of whom are in the bootlegging business too.

The Pagan Lady

1931

Call Her Savage poster
5.7

A high-spirited and short-tempered Texan woman storms her way through life until her luck runs out, forcing her to learn the error of her ways.

Call Her Savage

1932

Fast Life poster
9.0

A man is tried and convicted for the murder of a man who flirted with his wife., and sentenced to death However, it turns out that he is innocent of the murder and that the real killer has close ties to a powerful politician.

Fast Life

1929

The Reckless Hour poster
6.6

Seduced and abandoned, with child, by a charming cad, a former New York fashion model learns to detest the male race in general until befriended by a warm-hearted artist-type who shows her that life -- and men -- ain't so bad in this early talkie drama.

The Reckless Hour

1931

The Big Shakedown poster
5.9

Former bootlegger Dutch Barnes pressures neighborhood druggist Jimmy Morrell into making cut-rate knockoff toiletry, cosmetic, and pharmaceutical products.

The Big Shakedown

1934

Children of the Ritz poster
7.0

A spoiled rich girl falls for a poor chauffeur. Their situations are changed when her family loses all their money and he wins $50,000 at a racetrack. They get married, but it's not long before she starts spending their money the way she used to spend hers. Complications ensue.

Children of the Ritz

1928

Don Juan's 3 Nights poster
3.7

A concert pianist who is popular with women tries to discourage a teenage admirer.

Don Juan's 3 Nights

1926

She Hired a Husband poster
NR

Daphne Trowbridge, an impulsive and obstinate but nonetheless kindhearted young woman, lives with her aunt and uncle on their country estate. Daphne falls in love with Tom Dunstan, but when she learns that Mrs. Trowbridge favors the young man, she deserts him, whereupon he departs for the woods brokenhearted. Because her aunt dislikes Gerald, Daphne accepts his proposal, but on the day of the wedding, she discovers that Mrs. Trowbridge has liked him from the beginning. Furious at her aunt's scheming, Daphne hires the first man she meets, who happens to be a heavily bearded lumberman, to marry her and then leave. Later, however, her hired husband abducts her to his cabin in the woods, where he eventually succeeds in taming her. After he rescues her from two lecherous lumberjacks, Daphne discovers that her husband is Tom, whom she had loved all along.

She Hired a Husband

1918

The Prince of Headwaiters poster
7.0

Pierre, the maitre d' at the swanky Ritz Hotel in Paris, discovers that he has a son from his former marriage, which was broken up by his wealthy wife's upper-class relatives. His son, now a young man and unaware that Pierre is is father, is in danger of becoming the victim of blackmailer Mae Morin. Pierre sets out to save him from the notorious Mae.

The Prince of Headwaiters

1927

The Half-Way Girl poster
9.0

When her traveling theatrical group goes broke, Poppy, an actress in the troupe, finds herself stranded in Singapore. She's reduced to working in a bar in the seedy part of town as a "hostess", where she meets a down-on-his-luck Englishman. While drunk he gets into a fight, and is forced to kill his opponent in self-defense. The girl helps him escape and goes to Sam, a shady plantation owner, to try to get them out of Singapore. However, Sam has his own plans for Poppy, and they don't include potential rivals for her affections.

The Half-Way Girl

1925

Behind the Mask poster
5.8

A Secret Service agent nabs a scalpel-happy doctor who runs drugs in caskets.

Behind the Mask

1932

The Noose poster
7.7

In this suspenseful silent crime drama, a hijacker proves his loyalty to his mother by killing his biological father, a blackmailing gangster who has been threatening to destroy the mother's happy marriage to the governor.

The Noose

1928

One Night at Susie's poster
5.8

A woman gets help from her gangster friends after her foster son takes the blame for a murder he did not commit.

One Night at Susie's

1930

Millie poster
5.3

After a tumultuous first marriage, Millie Blake learns to love her newfound independence and drags her feet on the possibility of remarriage. The years pass, and now Millie's daughter garners the attentions of men - men who once devoted their time to her mother.

Millie

1931

If I Marry Again poster
3.3

When his son marries a woman whose mother is the madame of a brothel, a wealthy father in San Francisco disowns him. The newlyweds travel to the South Seas, where he gets a job on a plantation. The father sends an agent to the plantation to try to buy off his son's bride, but she won't go for it.

If I Marry Again

1925

The Right of Way poster
10.0

Snobbish attorney Charles 'Beauty' Steele loses his wife due to his drinking and his airs at the same time that his brother-in-law absconds with funds belonging to one of Steele's clients. In search of the thief, Steele is attacked and left for dead. He is rescued by a kindly couple, but suffers from amnesia.

The Right of Way

1920

Scarlet Seas poster
4.0

A sea captain comes to rescue of a prostitute in Shanghai, who is being run out of town. He takes her aboard his ship and heads out to sea. Not long afterwards the ship sinks but the pair manage to get into a lifeboat before it goes under. They are later picked up by a passing ship, but it turns out that the crew had just mutinied against their captain and taken over the ship.

Scarlet Seas

1928

The Huntress poster
8.0

Bela, reared by Indians, learns that she is a white orphan and runs away from the Indian village to avoid marrying a brave from the tribe. She determines to marry land prospector Sam Gladding, who resists her advances but later falls in love with Bela when an Indian sage gives him some advice.

The Huntress

1923

Chickie poster
7.0

Young stenographer Chickie Bryce dreams of marrying a millionaire. Until then, though, she is content to carry on with Barry, a lawyer from a nearby office. The relationship soon becomes serious, but one day Chickie meets an actual millionaire, Jake, who sweeps her off her feet. Barry tries to win her back, but his efforts are stymied by Ila, a girl who is in love with Barry and doesn't want him to get back with Chickie.

Chickie

1925

The Finger Points poster
6.4

Lee is a fresh young kid from the South when he gets a job with The Press. His first assignment on gangsters gets his name in the paper, the police on a raid and Lee in the hospital.

The Finger Points

1931

The Finger Points poster
6.4

Lee is a fresh young kid from the South when he gets a job with The Press. His first assignment on gangsters gets his name in the paper, the police on a raid and Lee in the hospital.

The Finger Points

1931

The Heart of a Follies Girl poster
9.0

A clerk falls in love with a beautiful dancer with the Ziegfeld Follies. Not being able to support the girl in the manner to which she is accustomed, he commits forgery in order to get the money to buy her an engagement ring. Complications ensue.

The Heart of a Follies Girl

1928

A Taste of Life poster
8.0

When her husband, struggling lawyer Horace Dillingham, is unable to provide adequate money for her insatiable desire for expensive cherries, Kitty Dillingham goes to work as a stenographer for him. One day while Horace is out of the office, Kitty mistakes Jonas Collamore, a defendant in a divorce suit for whom Horace is acting, for an important client. Kitty agrees to lunch, and, swallowing many maraschino cherries along with their cocktails, becomes drunk. Jonas takes her to a nearby inn where they are followed by Mrs. Collamore's detectives, who then summon Mrs. Collamore and her lawyer Horace.

A Taste of Life

1919

Man Wanted poster
9.0

No synopsis available yet.

Man Wanted

1922

Flirting with Love poster
9.0

When Wade Cameron, chairman of the Better Plays Society, stops the production of actress Gilda Lamont's first stage success, she attempts to revenge herself by affecting another personality and earning his confidence. He assigns her a role in an improvised production of a new play as an unknown actress, derails her attempt to expose him, and ends by winning her heart.

Flirting with Love

1924

A Self Made Wife poster
7.0

Tim Goodwin and his wife Corrie are living in poverty when Tim's oil well strikes it rich. He soon works his way to the top of the social scale, but Corrie doesn't change at all--she stays a dour, drab woman with no social skills whatsoever. Tim gets so embarrassed by her that he hires a "social secretary" for her to teach her how to function in the social strata in which they find themselves.

A Self Made Wife

1923

Bride of the Regiment poster
6.5

As they are leaving the church following their wedding, Count Adrian Beltrami and Countess Anna-Marie are told that the Austrians are marching on the town to quell an Italian uprising. The bride and relatives induce the count to flee to his castle, but Tangy, a silhouette cutter, brings word from the revolutionary committee asking him to return; the count goes, asking Tangy to pose as the count and protect Anna-Marie.

Bride of the Regiment

1930

Out of the Ruins poster
8.0

He hid from life in the ruins -he came out of the ruins to death! A man condemned to live in the shadow of a great love-never to realize it until he makes the supreme sacrifice.

Out of the Ruins

1928

Heiress For a Day poster
NR

Working as a manicurist at the Ritz, Helen Thurston, is in love with her wealthy patron, Jack Standring, but the young man's mother wants him to marry a rich debutante. Helen is informed that she has inherited her grandfather's millions, and she proceeds as quickly as possible to acquire expensive clothing and jewelry on credit. Jack, however, is not impressed. Soon Helen learns that she has inherited only $1,000, the remainder of the fortune having gone to her cousin Spindrift. The creditors hound her for their money, and at a grand ball at the Standring home, a detective threatens to arrest her. Touched by her poverty, Jack decides to elope with her. Finally Spindrift violates the conditions of the will, and Helen inherits the entire fortune.

Heiress For a Day

1918

Love's Blindness poster
8.0

A British nobleman, heavily in debut to a moneylender, agrees to marry the man's daughter in exchange for his debt being cleared. However, since the girl is Jewish, her new "husband" lets her know that the marriage is strictly a business matter and that he could never have romantic feelings for one of "her kind".

Love's Blindness

1926

Blackbirds poster
10.0

Adventuress Leonie Sobatsky falls in love with a young man named Nevil Trask, and he with her. Trask doesn't know that Leonie is actually the head of an international smuggling ring--and Leonie doesn't know that Trask is an undercover Secret Service agent assigned to break up the ring and capture its head.

Blackbirds

1920

Love's Prisoner poster
5.9

A young lady, who "hates the law" rises from the tenements to society. Financial reverses lead her to commit a series of burglaries as "The Bird". She becomes involved with the detective investigating the burglaries. After she confesses and pays for her crimes, they marry.

Love's Prisoner

1919

Hobbled Hearts poster
NR

Hobbled Hearts comedy short

Hobbled Hearts

1917

The Crystal Cup poster
7.0

A beautiful young girl has been raised by her bitter mother to hate all men, but her beauty means that men are constantly after her. She rejects them all, leading some to believe that she may be a lesbian. To stop those rumors, she begins a platonic relationship with a young writer, but things don't work out exactly as planned.

The Crystal Cup

1927