Howard Gaye

Two families, abolitionist Northerners the Stonemans and Southern landowners the Camerons, intertwine. When Confederate colonel Ben Cameron is captured in battle, nurse Elsie Stoneman petitions for his pardon. In Reconstruction-era South Carolina, Cameron founds the Ku Klux Klan, battling Elsie's congressman father and his African-American protégé, Silas Lynch.

The story of a poor young woman, separated by prejudice from her husband and baby, is interwoven with tales of intolerance from throughout history.

For years, a blackmailer has been preying on the weaknesses of others throughout London. When Holmes hears of the utter misery this mystery man is creating, he adopts a campaign to thwart his evil scheming. The campaign astonishes Dr. Watson by its strangeness and finds Holmes falling in love.

Philip de Mornay, a courtier in the French royal court of the 18th century, falls in love with Daphne La Tour, the daughter of a nobleman. Knowing that her family would never approve of their marriage, he takes her and hides her in a brothel, but is soon captured by pirates. Soldiers looking for women to bring with them to a settlement across the ocean in Louisiana raid the brothel and take the girls, including Daphne. Later on the trip to the new world their ship is attacked by pirates--and she discovers that her lover Philip is on board the pirate ship.

Young Annesley Grayle, weary of a gloomy, uneventful existence with her aunt, accepts the proposal of a young American that she pose as his wife. Later, they are actually married. When, at a ball, she hears her husband accused of stealing a valuable diamond and realizes that he is indeed a thief, she hides the jewel to save him.

Carlotta Peel, who though sheltered from the facts of life by her Victorian aunt has acquired some knowledge from indiscriminate reading, meets Diaz, a celebrated pianist, at a concert and spends the evening with him. Later, in London, she acquires fame as a novelist and is followed to France by married publisher Frank Ispenlove, who commits suicide when she spurns him. In Paris, Carlotta finds Diaz a physical wreck from drinking absinthe and devotes herself to his regeneration.

Renee is a French artist's model who uses morphine as an escape from the dull reality of her life. She recommends it to a neurotic artist because "it kindles the fires of genius." The artist quickly becomes addicted to the drug and the quality of his work begins to disintegrate. He takes on a new model, marries her, and starts her on the same path of moral degradation, until a guilt-ridden Renee decides to intervene in order to save them both. According to silent film historian Kevin Brownlow, THE DEVIL'S NEEDLE was banned by the state of Ohio, but the censor board reversed its decision after recognizing the positive message beneath the film's scandalous surface. This special edition was mastered from a 35mm preservation print of the 1923 re-release version. The only known surviving copy, the element suffers significant nitrate decomposition during some scenes.