Wives and Other Wives (1919)

Genres - Drama  |   Run Time - 4 min.  |   Countries - United States  |   MPAA Rating - NR
  • AllMovie Rating
  • User Ratings (0)
  • Your Rating

Share on

Synopsis by Janiss Garza

In this comedy-drama, Mary Miles Minter plays Robin Challoner, a new bride who wants to get the attention of her husband Geoffrey (Colin Chase) by making him jealous. She's too successful at this -- when he catches her burning some old love letters (from who, she won't tell him), he walks out on her. A while later, Mr. and Mrs. Craig (William Garwood and Margaret Shelby, Minter's real-life sister) come to see the Challoners' upstairs neighbors, a judge (George Periolat) and his wife. Mr. Craig gets off on the wrong floor, wanders into the Challoner's apartment and Robin, believing him to be a burglar, shoots at him. He faints, and Robin runs out for a doctor. Her husband comes home, finds the unconscious man in his wife's bedroom and decides it is time for a divorce. The judge, wanting to resolve things with the couple, invites them to his country home, along with Mrs. Craig, who is not exactly happy with her husband, either. Mr. Craig, after a few drinks, also goes to the country, in search of his wife. This results in a number of farce-like plot twists, made even more complicated by a fake jewel heist perpetrated by yet another couple staying with the judge. Everything works out in the end, and Mr. Challoner discovers that those annoying love letters to his wife were actually ones he himself had written to her back when they were courting. Minter actually did very well with this sort of material, and it's too bad that her mother and studio executives tried instead to mold her into another Mary Pickford.