Wars' Women: A Stupendous Cinema Spectacle in Six Acts

[Minneapolis, Minnesota]: Friedman Film Corporation, 1915. Very good to near-fine. Letter folds, short tear to center of folds (no loss of content).. Modesty is kicked to the curb in this flashy illustrated advertisement for a showing of "Wars' Women", a self-described "stupendous" 1915 silent film starring Enid Markey denouncing violence towards the "weaker sex" in times of war. "Wars' Women" appears to be a lost film, but survives in the form of reprints reissued under the titles "The Despoiler" (1916) and "The Awakening" (1920); the film was rarely shown, however, due to censorship issues (AFI Catalog). It was most recently restored and shown by the Cinémathèque française in 2010 based on a French reprint which was shorter and featured added intertitles. The present advertisement offers several stills from the film that highlight both its melodramatic flair and racist content (the villain, "The Emir", is played by the actor Frank Keenan with dark makeup and exaggerated stereotypical features-- perhaps a reason why there haven't been more efforts to re-screen the film in recent years).

Photo-illustrated bifolium (11" by 8"). While much of the advertisement is quotable, this is perhaps the best: "The producer [of Wars' Women], believing good can only be accomplished by frankness, has dragged forth naked Truth that the world may be confronted by the realities that exist when maddened, drunken, victorious warriors hold helpless within their grasp God's fairest flowers--Women" (p. [4]).