Silent Cinema - A Mother's Fight

The film is based on a short novel written in 1900 by the Danish 1917 Nobel Prize laureate Henrik Pontoppidan, Lille Rødhætte (Little Red Riding Hood), which was adapted for the stage in 1914, retitled Thora van Deken. Directed by John W. Brunius (Sweden, 1920). 85 min. Directed by John W. Brunius. (Sweden, 1920)

When Thora van Deken is called to the deathbed of her divorced husband, Squire Niels Engelstoft, and finds that he has bequeathed a substantial part of his estate to the foundation of a nursing home rather than to their daughter Esther, she pleads with him to revoke his will — but he dies before any changes can be made. So Thora takes the matter into her own hands by stealing the will and taking over the estate as Esther’s guardian, claiming that the will was burned in agreement with her late husband before he died. As rumors spread, Thora stands firm, committed to maintaining control of the estate on behalf of her daughter at all costs. But when Esther falls in love with the young idealistic pastor Bjerring, despite her mother’s preventative efforts, all Thora’s work may have been for nothing.