"...you're an angel---even if you haven't got wings"--just another heavy-handed quote from "Love's Prisoner"
When the film abruptly begins, you learn that the police are scum and have harassed a man to death due to his once having been in prison. His daughter, Nancy, hates the police and blames them for her desperate straights in life. Forced to get a job and scrimp and save to take care of her two younger siblings, her life is not easy.
Here is where the movie gets really stupid. It is possible that originally there was more to this but you see her meet a British member of the royalty. Then, on a SINGLE intertitle card it tells you that they married and then he soon died--leaving her a widow!! I cannot believe that so much was summed up in a sentence or two.
Now Nancy learns the sad truth--most of the dead husband's money and property is in England and his family is fighting her for it. Instead of reacting normally, she just gives up claim to all the English estates and lives in a single home but without enough money to maintain the opulent lifestyle. So, this leaves her poor but outwardly comfortable. To make ends meet, she robs her guests when she has big society parties. So, she refuses to fight for her rightful claim to her husband's entire estate and resorts to a life of crime--now that's excellent thinking! Into this mess, a dashing officer is called to investigate. What happens next? Well, it's also summed up on one intertitle card!
My score of 4 is awfully low but reflects the movie as it exists today. Had the film been more complete, my score would have probably been a bit higher. However, even in its complete form it would be a film with a few serious drawbacks. As it is, the film is about 47 minutes long even though it's missing the opening credits and the finale. Instead of a resolution to the film, you are given a single intertitle card which explains everything you WOULD have seen in the last portion of the film. Because of this, it's not a film I'd recommend to anyone unless they are a die-hard cinemaniac or a film historian. It's a shame, as it's one of the few Olive Thomas movies we still have (this and "The Flapper").
