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Who's Your Neighbor?

Who's Your Neighbor?
Whosyourneighbor 1917 newspaperad.jpg
Contemporary newspaper advertisement for the film.
Directed by S. Rankin Drew
Produced by Edward Small
Written by S. Rankin Drew
Willard Mack
Starring Christine Mayo
Edited by Frank Lawrence
Production
company
Master Drama Features
Release date
  • June 15, 1917 (1917-06-15)
Running time
Seven reels originally
Country United States
Language Silent (English intertitles)

Who's Your Neighbor? is a 1917 silent American propaganda and drama film directed by S. Rankin Drew. The film's plot focuses around reformers who pass a law to force prostitutes, including Hattie Fenshaw, out of the red light district. Fenshaw becomes Bryant Harding's mistress and lives in an apartment next door to a reformer, and continues to ply her trade. After Fenshaw becomes familiar with Harding, his son, daughter and the daughter's fiance, the climax of the film occurs as the cast assembles at Fenshaw's apartment. Harding returns and a fight breaks out that results in the reformers' arrival and concludes with the presumption that Fenshaw returns to a place of "legalized vice". The drama was written by Willard Mack and was his first foray into screen dramas. The film proved controversial, but is noted as a great success. The film originally debuted on June 15, 1917, but it was rejected by the National Board of Review and was later approved after a revision, but the film continued to be labeled as an immoral production. The film is presumed to be lost.

A group of reformers, led by Mrs. Bowers, moves to have the red light district closed and force the girls out. District Attorney Osborne, believes that it will turn out poorly for the town and tries to persuade the reforms that it would be like scattering smallpox. He fails to persuade them and the law is passed. The film focuses on one of the prostitutes, Hattie Fenshaw, who is forced out from her place of vice. According to H. D. Fretz's review, Fenshaw is determined to let those at a prominent hotel know that "women such as she had better be left alone", but is quickly recognized and evicted. At the hotel, Fenshaw makes an acquaintance of Bryant Harding who decides to keep her as his mistress and pays Fenshaw's rent in an apartment next door to one of the reformers, Mrs. Osborne. Fenshaw also charms Dudley Carleton, who breaks off his engagement to Betty Hamlin, the daughter of Harding, who uses her divorced mother's maiden name. Hamlin and Fenshaw meet through an introduction with Mrs. Bowers, and Hamlin, unaware of Fenshaw's character is telephoned by Fenshaw to come and sew for her to earn some money. Hal Harding, a college student with a desire to see the city, is introduced to Fenshaw during his father's absence. The cast assembles at Fenshaw's apartment when Hamlin arrives and interrupts Fenshaw's party with her ex-fiance and her brother, Hal. She is then introduced to her brother under and assumed name and is in the apartment when Bryant Harding returns. A fight breaks out and Harding nearly kills Carleton and knocks Fenshaw unconscious and shoots at his daughter, but misses. Alerted by the shot, the District Attorney, Mrs. Bowers and her reformer friends arrive and learn of Hattie Fenshaw's vice. Shorey's film review concludes with the presumption that Fenshaw returns to a place of "legalized vice" with Mrs. Bowers' permission.


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