Charles Giblyn

Directing

Charles Giblyn

Born 1871-09-06 · Watertown, New York, USA

Charles Giblyn (September 6, 1871 – March 14, 1934) was an American film director and actor of the silent era. He directed 96 films between 1912 and 1927. He also appeared in 23 films between 1914 and 1934. He was one of the founders of the Motion Picture Directors Association. Founded Albion Productions, a film production company, in 1922. He was born in Watertown, New York and died in Los Angeles, California.

Acting credits

Party Girl poster
3.8

Jay Rountree, a young, rising businessman and a son of a wealthy manufacturer gets caught up in a web involving an escort service or 'party girls' and trapped into an unhappy marriage.

Party Girl

1930

The Bad Sister poster
5.6

Marianne falls in love with con man Valentine who uses their relation to get her father's endorsement on a money-raising scheme. He runs off with the money and Marianne, later dumping her. Her sister Laura loves Dr. Lindley although she knows he loves Marianne. Marianne returns and marries a wealthy young man, and Lindley turns his love toward Laura.

The Bad Sister

1931

What! No Beer? poster
5.7

When Prohibition ends, a barber tries to get in the liquor business only to come up against mobsters.

What! No Beer?

1933

Only Saps Work poster
6.0

Rubber-legged comedian Leon Errol made his talkie starring bow in Paramount's Only Saps Work. Based on a play by Owen Davis Sr., the film casts Errol as James Wilson, a kleptomaniac who starts with picking pockets and ends up robbing a bank. Wilson's friend Lawrence Payne (Richard Arlen) inadvertently aids our hero during one of his heists, ending up in deep doo-doo with the law. Before Wilson is able to extricate Payne from his dilemma for the sake of heroine Barbara Tanner (Mary Brian), he pauses long enough to pose as a private eye -- and even gives bellboy Oscar (Stu Erwin) tips on how to spot a crook! If only all of Leon Errol's feature films had been as consistently hilarious as Only Saps Work.

Only Saps Work

1930

No artwork available
9.0

While trying to nab a gang of diamond smugglers, the police are notified by Scotland Yard that the gang's leader, a beautiful Englishwoman who was on her way to the States to take control of the gang, has been caught. Because the American gangsters don't know what their English boss looks like, the police persuade a female impersonator to pretend to be her and infiltrate the gang.

Maid to Order

1931

Alias French Gertie poster
6.3

A safecracker poses as a French maid in order to gain access to wealthy homes. In the midst of a nocturnal search for a cache of valuables, she is interrupted by another safecracker. Narrowly escaping arrest, they decide to pool their talents, but she gets the urge to reform and encourages him to do the same.

Alias French Gertie

1930

The Mysterious Dr. Fu Manchu poster
6.0

A Chinese doctor vows revenge against the allied troops who killed his wife and child during the Boxer Rebellion.

The Mysterious Dr. Fu Manchu

1929

The Secret Six poster
5.6

Bootlegger/cafe owner, Johnny Franks recruits crude working man Scorpio to join his gang, masterminded by crooked criminal defense lawyer Newton. Scorpio eventually takes over Frank's operation, beats a rival gang, becomes wealthy, and dominates the city for several years until a secret group of six masked businessmen have him prosecuted and sent to the electric chair.

The Secret Six

1931

Afraid to Talk poster
6.5

Corrupt politicians resort to murder and blackmail when a young boy accidentally witnesses them taking payoffs.

Afraid to Talk

1932

Let's Fall in Love poster
8.0

A carnival girl pretends to be Swedish in order to win a movie role.

Let's Fall in Love

1933

Night World poster
6.8

"Happy" MacDonald and his unfaithful wife own a Prohibition era night club. On this eventful night, he is threatened by bootleggers, and the club's star dancer falls in love with a young socialite who drinks to forget a personal tragedy, among other incidents.

Night World

1932

Playboy of Paris poster
7.0

Yvonne, daughter of Philibert, a Paris cafe owner, is in love with dreamy, blundering Albert, a waiter, though he pays little attention to her. Philibert plans to marry his daughter to a wealthy Parisian, but upon learning that Albert is to come into a large inheritance, he conspires to place him under a longterm contract, confident that he willingly will pay a forfeit to break it.

Playboy of Paris

1930

The Girl Said No poster
5.8

A comedy romance in which breezy Haines, as a young lady killer, tries to capture the heart of Hyams who has turned him down for Bushman. Haines plots dozens of extreme measures to win her over, and finally goes so far as to drag her from the altar, bound and gagged.

The Girl Said No

1930

Her Wild Oat poster
10.0

In this feature comedy, silent film star Colleen Moore plays a woman who owns a small lunch wagon and falls for a duke’s son, played by Larry Kent, who is pretending to be his own chauffeur. With her savings, she pursues him to a resort hotel, only to be mistaken for a duchess. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in partnership with Národní filmový archív in 2007.

Her Wild Oat

1927

Woman Trap poster
5.3

The younger brother of a police captain is a wanted fugitive, so when the captain railroads his brother's former criminal partner, the partner's sister devises a plan to get back at the captain where it will hurt the most.

Woman Trap

1929

Prosperity poster
5.8

Longtime friends become feuding mothers-in-law when their children marry.

Prosperity

1932

Behind the camera

No artwork available
10.0

Mary Walton finds herself in a dire situation when her first husband falls seriously ill. In a misguided and desperate attempt to secure the resources or help needed to save her ailing husband, she becomes a bigamist by marrying another man. Things do not turn out well.

The Woman

1913

Singing River poster
10.0

Outlaw Sam Hemp attempts to induce homesteader Lang Rush, faced with foreclosure due to drought, to rob the bank as restitution. The exchange escalates into a gunfight leaving Sam and his wealthy friend, Drayton, dead. Fleeing to the mountains and the refuge of a deserted shack near Singing River Lang prospects for silver. Another former homesteader, Bert Condon, trails Lang in the hope of collecting a $5,000 reward, but befriends the fugitive and assists in filing Lang's claim when he strikes ore. On his return to town, Lang rescues the sheriff's daughter, Alice Thornton, from Hemp's gang and defeats their leader, L. W. Bransom, in a fistfight. He then clears himself of the murder charge and wins Alice.

Singing River

1920

Sunshine Nan poster
NR

Nance Molloy's cheerful disposition, in sharp contrast to the slum near the cathedral where she and her parents make their home, earns her the nickname "Sunshine Nan." However, her fights with the cathedral choirboys, led by MacPherson Clark, gets her into trouble. For interfering in a family squabble, she and her pal, Dan Lewis, are sent to reform school for five years, and upon her release, she becomes a stenographer in the elder Clark's shoe factory. Dan meanwhile has taken a job in the factory's chemical department, where he invents a dye process that promises to make him rich.

Sunshine Nan

1918

No artwork available
10.0

Richard Barr, who lives in the suburbs of New York, and John Colville, honest directors of a dishonestly managed corporation, are fighting to save their own investments and those of small individual shareholders from ruin. They are holding a very important meeting that will last well into the night.

Thieves

1914

The Price She Paid poster
NR

At the death of John Gower, his widow and daughter, Mildred, find themselves with only a few thousand dollars, as the family lived almost up to the limit of Cower's income. Mildred's mother tells her it is necessary that she marry money. Mildred is fond of Stanley Baird, but her hopes in this direction are shattered by the announcement of his engagement to another woman. Mrs. Gower marries Presbury, an elderly man who thinks she is wealthy, and when he learns the truth he begins taunting Mildred until she is willing to do anything to escape from her humiliating position.

The Price She Paid

1917

The Mountain Woman poster
10.0

In the hills of Kentucky, Alexander McGivens, known as "the girl in pants," is reared by her father as if she were a boy. When her father, Aaron, is wounded in a fight with Bud Sellers, the girl undertakes to get her father's logs to market with the help of a crew from the lumber camp. Her numerous suitors include a young Irishman, Jerry O'Keefe, roughneck Jase Mallows, and a wealthy young easterner, Jack Halloway. After delivering the logs, she entrusts her money to the repentant Bud Sellers, and on her return trip she is captured by Mallows and his followers. She finally reaches home, where she offers her hand to O'Keefe, the soft-spoken mountaineer.

The Mountain Woman

1921

Peck's Bad Girl poster
NR

Minnie Penelope Peck, the village scamp of Yaptank, accompanies her father to the bank to demand the nine dollars owed him for his work as a night watchman. When the bank president refuses to pay Peck, Minnie posts a sign which states that the bank is insolvent, whereupon all of the depositors immediately demand their money. The fire department is called in to quell the mob, but things get worse when Minnie accidentally turns on the fire hose.....

Peck's Bad Girl

1918

Peggy poster
NR

The heroine, Peggy Cameron, is a high-society debutante with a mind of her own. After making a public spectacle of herself once too often, Peggy is bundled off to Scotland, where she is to be looked after by her no-nonsense uncle Andrew Cameron (William H. Thompson). If Peggy's family had hoped that she would straighten up and behave herself in Scotland, they were sorely mistaken. Restored in 2018 by the Academy Film Archive with restoration funding provided by the Louis B. Mayer Foundation.

Peggy

1916

The Studio Girl poster
NR

The original play's French locale was changed to New England, where Celia Laird resides with her two overprotective aunts. When artist Frazer Ordway arrives in town, he falls in love with Celia -- much to the dismay of the aunts, who'd intended the girl to marry a local millionaire.

The Studio Girl

1918

The Battle of Gettysburg poster
1.0

A young woman's sweetheart fights for the Union Army, while her brother fights for the Confederates.

The Battle of Gettysburg

1913

No artwork available
NR

Prince Tonio of Bothalia, a mythical kingdom in the Balkan Mountains, escapes an arranged marriage to Princess Athalia, the elderly daughter of a neighboring king. Filled with wanderlust, he becomes a sailor and goes to San Francisco where he meets a young singer...

The Vagabond Prince

1916

No artwork available
NR

Colonel Crewe, in charge of a fort near the Mexican border, receives word that some Chinese are about to be smuggled across the line. He details Lieutenant Hurd to attend to the matter. Hurd, with a few soldiers, succeeds in capturing the Chinese, among whom is a Christianized girl, Moon Chew. She falls in love with Hurd.

The Sign of the Snake

1913

A Woman's Woman poster
NR

A woman finds herself being a unpaid skivvy to her husband, two daughters and her son.

A Woman's Woman

1922

The Honeymoon poster
NR

Immediately after Susan Lane becomes Mrs. Richard Greer, she grows jealous when she sees her husband talking to Marion Starr, one of her bridesmaids. Susan's brother Phil wishes to marry Marion, but is entangled with actress Maizie Middleton. Consequently, Dick Greer agrees to see Maizie, whose troupe is playing Niagara, and attempts to buy her off.

The Honeymoon

1917

Black Is White poster
10.0

A man's jealousy of his wife ruins their marriage. She leaves, taking a new name and beginning anew. Years later, they meet, but the husband does not know it is she. They marry, with the wife hoping that time has changed her husband for the better.

Black Is White

1920

No artwork available
9.0

A railroad plant is set afire by striking workmen, and the firemen are prevented from extinguishing the flames by the infuriated strikers. The troops are called out and martial law prevails.

The Seal of Silence

1913

Civilization's Child poster
8.0

After an idyllic mountain life in Russia, Berna goes to live with her uncle in the Jewish section of Kiev, arriving just as Cossacks massacre most of the Jews in the city. Berna escapes to New York and works at a sweatshop controlled by Boss Jim McManus, but he seduces her, then throws her out on the street, and she becomes a prostitute. Berna later marries Nicolay Turgenev, a young musician,

Civilization's Child

1916

No artwork available
NR

The youthful monarch, Edward IV of England, is treacherously advised by Sir Stephen Fitz Allen, who is the King's boon companion, in favor of turning down the offer of Louis XI to cease the controversy that has been pending so long. The King, Edward IV, follows the advice of his companion and the French messenger meets with an insult, returning to the French court in a quandary.

The Higher Law

1914

The Lesson poster
NR

Bored by the slow pace of life in her little home town, Helen Drayton rebels when her friends and relatives assume that she will marry her friend and escort, Chet Vernon. Helen is so anxious to experience life in the big city that she falls in love with visiting New York architect John Galvin almost immediately after his arrival. Several weeks later, the two marry and move to New York, where, after a series of painful experiences, Helen finally realizes John's selfishness.

The Lesson

1918

The Tiger's Cub poster
10.0

Queen of the serials Pearl White gets herself into plenty of trouble up Klondike way as a young maiden named Tiger's Cub.

The Tiger's Cub

Upstairs and Down poster
7.0

Alice Chesterton is described as a "Baby Vamp" by the social set and engaged to boring Tom Carey. She flirts with many of the male guests idling at the Ives' Long Island house party, then encourages Terence O'Keefe, a playboy polo player from Ireland, to rendezvous with her in the city; they are seen together at the "Midnight Frolic". Because of this, Mrs. Ives convinces Alice's newly-arrived sister Betty to look after Alice.

Upstairs and Down

1919

Let's Get a Divorce poster
NR

A bit too immature for marriage, Cyprienne allows her pretty head to be turned by an egotistical fop. The girl demands that her husband Prunelles grant her a divorce, but he devises a scheme to bring her back into the matrimonial fold.

Let's Get a Divorce

1918

By the Sun's Rays poster
4.8

The earliest surviving film featuring Lon Chaney in a major role, By the Sun's Ray's was but one of several 2-reel westerns starring the florid Murdock MacQuarrie. MacQuarrie plays a detective investigating a series of gold shipment robberies. Along the way, he falls for a mine superintendent's pretty daughter (Agnes Vernon), much to the dismay of a sullen mine office clerk (Chaney), who is also smitten with the girl...

By the Sun's Rays

1914

No artwork available
8.0

A story of Puritan village life. The son of a minister wins a girl away from her devoted fisherman. Orphaned, she is adopted by the minister, and when her child is born refuses to reveal the father's name. She is cast out by the minister and scorned by the people. When her child is dying the fisherman comes back to her with unfaltering love, and the minister's son meets a tragic death at the hands of the Indians.

The Transgressor

1913